Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Five rolls over, shoving Lila away as he stumbles to his feet. Those briefcases sure make him dizzy sometimes.

“Where have you been?”

“Facing my mortality, Viktor, I don’t recommend it,” he deadpans. Allison gestures to the briefcase.

“You had the briefcase?” She exclaims. “We’ve been looking for this!”

“Well, look no further. That’s the last one on Earth,” Five says as she rushes to pick it up. “Or was the last one.” She throws it in frustration and he leans down to examine it. “Yeah, that’s toast.”

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Allison spits. Five blinks at her.

“Excuse me?”

“That was our way back- a way out of this, a way home for me or- or the rest of us- and you ruined it? For what?” She asks incredulously. Five glances at Lila, who has her arms around Diego’s neck; he missed whatever exchange happened between them. Viktor and Luther stare at Five and Allison apprehensively.

“We had to go to the Commission,” Five says, and Allison throws up her hands.

“Oh, of course you did.”

“You don’t understand-“

“I understand perfectly well,” Allison hisses, rounding on him. Five takes a step back for a reason he can’t explain. “I understand that you care about nobody but yourself. I understand that you took our briefcase because it offered you answers- not a solution to any of my problems, or Viktor’s, or even Klaus’s, but convenience for you.”

“If you’d let me explain what we found out, then maybe you’d get the importance of-“

“Oh, wait, no, let me guess. There’s another apocalypse coming,” Allison says, her voice dripping with sarcasm. Five closes his mouth and watches her eyebrows go up. “You can’t be serious.”

“It’s called a Kugelblitz,” Five says. Lila and Diego are watching now as Allison turns away, shaking her head as she laughs to herself. “Listen, Allison, as much as I’d like the time to explain it to you, we don’t have-“

“Where has all this gotten you, Five?” Allison turns back. “All this running around, chasing your next apocalyptic high. My child is dead. So is Ray, so is Sissy-“ she pauses, and decides to go for his throat. “So is Delores.”

“Don’t you dare bring her up,” Five grits out, narrowing his eyes. She chuckles.

“Don’t tell me you think a mannequin is actually worth more than the people we’ve all lost.”

“Allison,” Viktor warns quietly, but gets waved off. Five barely hears it as his skin heats up. Delores is the last person he wants to talk about with his family and Lila all around.

“You don’t understand what she’s worth,” he says lowly.

“I understand she was someone you were willing to give up. All to stop the apocalypse, and for what? To do it all over again? To keep sacrificing people until the world was set right enough for you?”

“That’s not what-“

“SHUT YOUR MOUTH!” Allison screams at him, and Five can’t explain why, but he chokes. His mouth shuts and all of a sudden he can’t open it at all, his hands going to claw at his throat desperately. For a moment he’s back in the apocalypse, lungs tight from the smoke surrounding him and his air supply quickly shrinking.

“Every time I build a life for myself,” Allison breathes. “You show up, rambling about some new apocalypse, and TAKE IT FROM ME!”

“How are you doing that?” He faintly hears Viktor ask as his little brother stands. Allison’s response isn’t one Five catches as he doubles over. Black spots appear at the edge of his vision. Strangulation isn’t something he’s unfamiliar with, but this- this suffocation through practically zipping his mouth closed- is it’s own kind of torture. He’s never tried to gasp for air and been physically incapable of it before, especially not because of his own sister’s mental block.

Five thinks he hears Luther say something, but the pressure on his throat continues. Five wonders somewhere in the back of his mind if blinking away will get rid of Allison’s control. He can’t try it, though; his vision is quickly fading with his oxygen and he needs a clear head to jump. On the verge of passing out is about as far from a clear head as it gets. He’s lucky he senses Allison lean in when she does.

“You should’ve stayed in the apocalypse,” she whispers, and Diego pulls away from Lila.

“Woah, Allison, that’s enough!” He yells, and she steps back, releasing her hold on him. Five drops to his knees, coughing up a storm and rubbing his lungs. God, that burns, although he can’t tell if he’s imagining it due to the apocalypse being brought up again.

He feels a hand on the back of his shoulder and looks up to find Diego standing over him. Five turns away, coughing harder. He’s fine. What Allison- his sister- said hadn’t affected him.

“All I ever wanted,” he manages to get out, “is to save you all. To keep you alive.” His gaze settles on Allison, who just glares as the spots start to clear. “We couldn’t have stayed in the 60s. You know that.”

“No, Five,” Allison shakes her head. “I don’t. And I’m not sure anyone else does either.”

“This new timeline isn’t that bad,” Luther mumbles. Five and Allison both ignore him.

“It was our only option to come here,” Five said. “I didn’t know it would take Claire. If I had, then maybe-“

“Then what?” Allison challenges. “Then you wouldn’t have brought us here? All for the sake of my daughter? Do you really expect me to believe that, with all the people you’ve killed?”

Five goes quiet, and Allison snorts. “Yeah. That’s what I thought,” she says. Diego’s hand slips from Five’s shoulder, and for some reason that hurts most of all.

“Fine,” he says, managing to get to his feet again. God, this body is not right for him. “I’ll stop trying to save your life, then. You let me know how that goes.”

“Five-“ he hears Luther try and stop him, but he’s already blinked away, up to the room he shares with his brothers. He stumbles when he lands, head still spinning a little, and collapses onto his bed half by accident.

The smell in the room is weird, and bad, which he would expect from a hotel Klaus recommended. Klaus. His most ridiculous brother had completely missed everything that just happened. He wonders where he is right now. It was honestly lucky that he and Lila traveled to a spot where that much of his family was. Or maybe unlucky, considering how it went.

Five takes a moment to breathe. Was his sister right? Should they not have taken the briefcase? Maybe if he’d prepared with Lila more, they could’ve found a way to get everyone back to wherever they ended up choosing. But they were wanted in the 60s. Then again, they were a rather powerful family and could probably have moved somewhere other than Dallas. That might’ve worked. But then Allison would still be upset, with no Claire. He thought she’d be here. He still didn’t understand what happened to their mothers; that was the cause of all this, not him. But without him taking his family here at least Allison would still have something…

Five closes his eyes, and drifts off to sleep.

When he wakes, Luther is standing over him. Five blinks sleep out of his eyes to see his monkey brother staring at him with concern. He doesn’t have time for this.

“What?” He mumbles groggily. Luther frowns at him like he’s some kind of strange specimen. Five does not like this look.

“You were muttering in your sleep. Something about fire. And smoke,” he says. Five sits up, waving him off.

“Leave me alone,” he grumbles. Luther steps back but hesitates, continuing to stare at him. Five fixes his tie before he looks at him.

“What?”

“What happened earlier- with Allison- it wasn’t right,” he says. “You, uh. Didn’t deserve that. So. Yeah.”

Just the kind of brotherly support Five was always looking for. His family sure has a way with words.

“Thanks,” he mutters anyway, getting off the bed and narrowly avoiding bumping his head on the bunk above him. He finds a mirror in their shared bathroom and tries to fix his collar. His suit is all wrinkled now, and he looks nowhere near as presentable as he did earlier. Why did he take a nap again? He didn’t need that.

“These have been a rough few weeks for you, huh?” Luther says awkwardly, sitting on his bed. The springs creak under his weight.

“Why, yes, Luther, they have,” Five replies dryly. “And I seem to distinctly remember you telling me you don’t give a shit about the apocalypse in a crappy bar not very long ago, so while I appreciate the fake concern, you can move on to whatever you’re actually here for.”

Luther scoffs.

“You don’t have to do that, Five,” he says. Five gives up fixing his outfit and pulls off his tie.

“Do what?”

“Push people away so they don’t get too close to you,” he says. Five rolls his eyes. “I mean, I think you’ve had the least chance for emotional growth out of all of us, so maybe that’s why you’re like this-“

Five blinks towards him in a flash, making Luther startle and half fall back onto his bed.

“I am like this because it’s how I survive,” Five hisses, leaning into his face. “I know how to keep my emotions under control, unlike the rest of you bozos. So leave. Me. Be.”

He blinks back into the bathroom and takes off his suit jacket. Luther clears his throat, sitting up a little and pretending like Five did not scare him just now. He’s quiet as Five throws the suit jacket aside and then unbuttons his waistcoat, taking that off as well. His formerly pristine white shirt is next. He untucks the shirt from his pants and quickly undoes the buttons as Luther decides to open his mouth again. 

“You know, Five, one might argue that anger issues are a great example of not keeping your emotions under…” Luther trails off as he looks at his brothers torso, Five turning back to him with a raised eyebrow. He has brand new bruises all over his stomach, chest, and one of his arms, likely from how hard he and Lila landed coming out of the portal earlier. Not to mention the shrapnel wound that doesn’t look like it healed properly, despite the stitches that had been put in.

“Jesus, Five.”

“It’s a weird kid’s body. I bruise easily,” Five shrugs, tossing his shirt into the laundry. It does not ease Luther’s concerns that he doesn’t even acknowledge the shrapnel wound. “Do you think there’s a Laundromat somewhere around here?”

“Is this how you treat all your injuries?” Luther asks. Five goes to the closet of the room. Maybe he can steal a shirt from Klaus.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean acting like they’re nothing.”

“Luther. This isn’t even my body. Don’t concern yourself over nothing,” Five says. He finds no clothes in the closet. Where is Klaus getting his shirts from? “Shit.”

“I’ll find something for you,” Luther says, deciding to let Five’s last (slightly disturbing, indicative of some kind of physical disconnection) comment go. “Just stay here, alright?”

“I kind of need to explain the new apocalypse to everyone,” Five says. Luther gives him a one-over as he stands.

“Well, would you like to do it like that, or would you like to wait for me to come back with a shirt?” He asks. Five stares up at him. Damn, Luther is ridiculously taller than his scrawny, “teenage” self.

“Fine. I’ll be here,” he sighs. “Should probably shower anyway,” he mumbles, more to himself than anything. That dusty Commission building where he met his future self did not leave him feeling super clean. Luther nods and leaves.

Five goes back to the mirror, running his hand over one of the bruises on his arm, which is yellower than the rest. It’s been a while since he looked at himself in a mirror, especially since getting into this new body. He’s scrawny, but feels slightly taller than a few weeks ago, which is odd. Maybe time traveling back to the year he first arrived in did something to his body. He’ll have to talk to Delores about that- oh. No. He won’t.

He shakes the thought off and closes the door, undressing the rest of the way before stepping into the shower. He washed off almost as soon as they got here the other day, but this shower would be the first time in a while that he’s established a pattern of, well. Consecutively taking care of himself. There hasn’t been the time or the resources for that most of his life.

There’s not really the time now, but what else is he supposed to do while waiting for Luther to get back?

He turns on the water, almost surprised when it heats up the way it’s supposed to. It takes him a moment to figure out how to twist the knob to get it to come out of the shower spout. As he stands up, he thinks of Hazel and Cha-Cha somewhere in the back of his mind, of them appearing here in 2019 barely a week before the world-ending apocalypse just to kill him. Whatever shitty hotel room they got to stay in would be about the most modern one possible (at least on the Commission’s budget), seeing as within a week there would be no more hotel rooms- or life- anywhere.

Except for little thirteen-year-old Five. All alone again and here to continue the cycle.

Five doesn’t notice that he’s just standing there staring at the floor now with the water beating down on his back. He’s lost in his own head, something he always got criticized for as a child. Apparently his father had been right about more than one thing. Five’s own habits- his arrogance, his distractible nature- would be the death of him. He absentmindedly places a hand to his throat, recalling earlier’s events. His arrogance caused that, not Allison. He doesn’t even blame her. Maybe she has a point. Maybe the apocalypse is the only place for him.

“Five?” Luther’s voice calls outside. Five startles a little, looking out. How long has he been standing there for? “Five!”

“I’m in here,” he yells back, not without exasperation. Was it that hard to figure out with the door closed?

“Well I called your name like five times,” Luther replies. Five frowns. He only heard two. “Anyway, I found you a shirt.”

“Already?” Five runs his fingers through his hair, letting the water hit his scalp. He has more hair than he’s used to on his head, although he’s been trying to keep it maintained. There’s silence for a moment.

“I’ve been gone for over half an hour,” Luther replies, sounding confused.

“Oh.”

“Are you alright in there, Five?”

“Fine. I’ll be out soon,” he replies. He splashes water on his face, unable to explain the loss of time. Maybe he hasn’t woken up properly yet. He rinses himself off some, deciding he doesn’t have time to do everything anymore- and besides, the water is getting cold. Or maybe it has been for the past few minutes and he didn’t notice. He steps out of the shower and grabs a bathrobe, throwing it over himself and tying the waist before he leaves the bathroom.

Luther is standing there holding a dark purple button-down shirt. Five raises an eyebrow.

“Best I could do on short notice,” Luther supplies. Five sighs and takes it from him.

“It’ll do. Thanks,” he says. Luther nods.

“We might have some trouble, uh, tracking everyone down. For this rundown of our new situation,” he says. Five steps back into the bathroom and closes the door behind him to get changed.

“Why?”

“Uh, I don’t know. Our siblings aren’t good at staying in one place,” Luther says. “You should know about that.”

“You’re right,” Five says. “My mistake for assuming they’ve matured.”

“Yeah. Well, I’ll try and help find them, but I shouldn’t be away from, uh. Sloane for too long,” Luther says. Five steps back out of the bathroom with pants on.

“Sloane?” He echoes, pulling on the shirt.

“Right, you’ve been gone. She’s the one with the levitation powers,” he says, grinning dopily. Five stares at him for a moment and his smile slowly fades. “What?”

“I can’t believe you sometimes,” Five mutters, tucking his shirt into his pants.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just help me find the others,” Five says tiredly, pulling his socks and shoes back on. Luther gets off the bed, dusting himself off a little bit and clearing his throat.

Five heads out of their room and down the hall, finding the elevator without waiting for Luther. He’s behind him anyway. Five runs a hand through his hair, which is still damp, trying to straighten it back to the way he keeps it parted.

“Need any help?” Luther asks. Five glares at him and he holds up his hands in surrender. “Just offering.”

“I am fine,” Five hisses, hitting the button for the elevator. It opens and he steps in, Luther following him and standing in the middle awkwardly. He still doesn’t seem to know how to adjust for his height and weight. Five can relate to that- albeit more in the opposite direction.

Five scratches at his neck as the elevator jolts and descends downwards. All he needs to do now is explain the situation to his family, and then tell them that he thinks maybe they should just leave it alone. That’s simple enough, right? It’s not like they even know where this Kugelblitz is. Surely they’ll be happy to hear that for once, he doesn’t want them to do anything.

This does not go as planned.

“So what, we just sit around and do nothing? What about Harlan?” Viktor asks helplessly. They’re sitting around the bar, Five having already poured himself a drink while explaining the Kugelblitz. He blinks at his younger brother.

“What about Harlan?”

“He wasn’t here, Viktor, he doesn’t know,” Diego mutters. Five looks at him. What was he not around for now? Why is he always gone for everything important?

What’s wrong with him?

“While you were with Lila, Harlan showed up,” Viktor explains. Five snaps out of it slightly. So he just missed something while at the Commission bunker, watching his older self die. That’s not too bad.

“And?”

“And, uh-“ Viktor looks away, clearing his throat slightly. Five raises his eyebrows, suspicion quickly growing.

“Viktor…”

“He, um-“ Diego looks around like someone is going to be listening in on them and lowers his voice to a whisper. “Killed Jayme and Alphonso.”

“Well.” Five blinks. “Alright.”

“They want to kill him now, I don’t think it’s a good idea…” Viktor scratches the back of his head awkwardly. For as powerful as he is, he was never the most confident of Five’s siblings.

“So your plan is to waste time protecting him?” Five asks. Viktor scoffs but doesn’t answer. The rest of them- Klaus, Diego, Lila, Luther- all turn towards Viktor.

“Well, I mean- I don’t know how his death would help anything-“

“If the Sparrows want him, they might let us see that black hole thing in their basement in exchange for him,” Klaus suggests. Five turns slowly towards him.

“Klaus, do you know where the Kugelblitz is?”

“Well if it looks like a black hole or something, then yeah, it’s been in the Sparrows’ basement this whole time. I saw it, when I went to visit Dad,” his brother says. Diego looks ready to kill him.

“Why didn’t you tell anyone?!”

“I did! I told you!”

“You say stupid shit all the time!”

Five ignores their bickering. “Of course. It appeared in the same place we did,” he mumbles. He turns towards Viktor, who looks ready to walk away. “We need access to the Kugelblitz, Viktor.”

“So what, you’re just going to sacrifice Harlan now?” Viktor asks, more than a note of accusation in his voice. Five narrows his eyes.

“He killed two of the Sparrows, Viktor. We need to at least get a look at this thing-“

“And how many people have you killed?” Viktor bites back. Five recoils as Diego and Klaus go silent. Unlike Allison, Viktor’s eyes immediately go wide with regret.

“I’m sorry, Five, I didn’t mean-“

“It’s fine,” he shuts him down, shaking his head and putting on a calm expression. He hopes it disguises the hurt that feels painstakingly clear to him at the moment. From the look on Luther’s face, it doesn’t. “It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.”

“I know you didn’t want to, I wasn’t saying-“

“Viktor. It’s fine,” he repeats. “Just, uh- you know, do whatever you want with Harlan. We can probably handle the few Sparrows left. If you want to use your last few days here protecting him, then that’s up to you.” He picks up his drink. “I’ll be in my room if anyone needs me.”

He blinks away, but doesn’t make it into his room this time. Instead, he jumps ten feet away from the bar or so, close enough to pick up what his siblings are saying as he walks off.

“Viktor, you can’t just-“

“I didn’t mean to-“

“Did you see the look on his face?”

“Especially after this morning-“

Five shakes his head, not daring to look back at them as he makes his way towards the elevator. If any of his family notice that he didn’t make it anywhere near their room, they don’t acknowledge it. Five sits down in the elevator once it opens, and isn’t sure how long he remains there.

Chapter Text

Klaus is the first- or maybe the second- to check on him.

Five picks himself up off the floor of the elevator at some point, thinking that the hotel seems weirdly emptier than it did a few days ago. He heads back to their room, drink tightly in hand- or what’s left of it anyway. It isn’t long before Klaus finds him slumped against the wall behind his bed, sipping dazedly at the bits of watered down liquid left in the glass through the tiny plastic straw he took for himself.

“Oh, Cinco,” Klaus says in a sing-songy voice as he closes the door behind him. Five’s gaze flicks wearily over to him. He is at least tipsy at this point, can feel a headache coming on, and is overall not in the mood for his brother’s shenanigans. Klaus comes over to him anyway.

“Man, you don’t look like you’re doing too hot,” he says, putting his hands on his hips and looking down at Five, who just sighs and sets his glass aside.

“What do you want, Klaus?”

“Why do I always need an excuse to spend time with my brother?” He asks, sitting heavily beside him. “Don’t you remember all the quality time we had together the other day? You and me, road-tripping through the Pennsylvanian countryside?”

“Oh, right,” Five says, sitting up a little. Klaus looks cheerful, thinking he’s struck some kind of sibling-bonding nerve- only for Five to immediately prove him wrong.

“I never finished those equations,” he says, pulling a notebook out from under his pillow and flipping it open. Klaus deflates with a sigh.

“Point is, mein Bruder, I am just here to cheer you up,” he says, poking him in the arm. Five distantly thinks that he’s lucky it isn’t the bruised one. “We miss you down there.”

“Oh yeah, I’m sure,” Five snorts, scribbling something in the lines of his notebook. “Miss making comments about my history, maybe.”

“Viktor didn’t mean it like that, you know he didn’t,” Klaus says. Five ignores him, writing down another line of math that looks far too complicated for Klaus to even try to follow. Klaus considers a moment before plucking the notebook out of his hands.

“What- Klaus-“ Five grabs for it, and Klaus holds it just out of reach, on his end of the bed.

“You know I died earlier today, Five,” he says, meeting his gaze. “If you want to talk about sibling problems, try your brother’s son shooting you in the chest.”

“Try your sister strangling you half to death,” Five shoots back. Klaus seems to short-circuit, and Five uses the opportunity to lunge and wrestle the notebook out of Klaus’s hands- not that he’s really trying to hold onto it anymore.

“Woah, woah, what? ” Klaus asks. Five sits back, picking up his pen again and meeting his brother’s eyes. He considers being a dick for a moment before deciding that Klaus clearly didn’t know. Perhaps due to the death he just mentioned.

“Well, it seems Allison found someone to blame Claire on,” Five says, looking back down at his notebook. Klaus sits back.

“Christ on a cracker.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Are you okay, man? Like, you didn’t die, I assume?” Klaus asks, frowning and tapping his shoulder for a moment as if to make sure he’s still there- which makes Five’s head hurt if he thinks about it for too long, seeing as he was very clearly having a conversation with most of his family, not just his ghost-seeing brother, no more than an hour ago.

“No, Klaus, I did not die,” he answers anyway, scribbling something else into his notebook.

“Well that’s good. I did earlier. Really,” Klaus nods. Five spares him a glance.

“I thought you were exaggerating.”

“No, apparently I’ve done it like, more than fifty times,” Klaus says. “Who knew, right? I always thought I was just getting lucky.”

“If it makes you feel any better, earlier I saw my future self die…” Five trails off mid-sentence, lifting his head again to look at Klaus before he frowns. Klaus tilts his head.

“What?”

“So you can’t die?” He asks. “You found out today that you just come back?”

“Yeah, isn’t that crazy?” Klaus says, running a hand through his hair. “And I talked to my mom, who somehow still knows she’s my mom, which is weird, right? I mean, if we’re in a different timeline, how does that work? I wonder what kind of overlap there is between time and death, you know, your world and my world, do you think we could test that-“

Five barely hears a word past that. It takes another moment of rambling before Klaus cuts off as he refocuses on Five, who is staring at Klaus like he’s seeing a ghost, which is kind of backwards if you think about it.

“Five?”

“That’s not right,” Five mumbles. His grip on his pen is very tight all of a sudden, to the point where he’s almost white-knuckling it.

“What’s not, buddy?”

“I found you,” he says. “Dead. In the apocalypse. You were dead, you can’t- I checked- you didn’t come back then, I buried you-“

“Five-“ Klaus starts to say something, but Five doesn’t hear it. He moves a hand to his throat, feeling his lungs tighten again, and half-glances around the room to check if Allison is there. He finds no angry sister, just dust that he swears wasn’t there before floating down from the ceiling. His mouth tastes like ash.

When he looks at Klaus, suddenly his hair is cut short again. His skin is a pale, sunken white, and his lips are a disturbing shade of grey. Five’s face turns a similar shade of chalk. Suddenly frantic, he reaches out, putting two fingers to Klaus’s throat and feeling for his pulse as Klaus stares deadly back at him.

“Five?” Someone is calling his name from very far away. “Five! ”

Five blinks a few times and his vision clears. The dust is gone, and Klaus is sitting there still, looking perfectly alive and normal with Five feeling for his pulse like a crazy person. Five clears his throat and pulls his hand away, but Klaus catches his wrist.

“Five,” he says evenly for a third time. (Or is it the fourth? The fifth? Five doesn’t know). “Breathe.”

“I’m fine. Let go,” Five replies, although it has nowhere near as much venom as he’d like it to.

“Checking that I’m alive doesn’t really show that, babe,” Klaus says. Five nearly hisses at him and wrenches his arm out of his grasp.

“Listen, I never know what’s happening on this- Earthly coil- when I’m dead, alright? So that’s probably why I didn’t wake up,” Klaus says. “But you’re not in the apocalypse, and we’re all fine, okay?”

“Sure,” Five mumbles. Klaus doesn’t get it. They’re not in the original apocalypse, but there’s another one coming up, and his sister hates him and he’s a killer, will always be a killer, so maybe she’s right to. And now he’s finding out he might have buried his brother alive the first time around, accidentally given him some kind of signal that there was nothing to wake up to, when he could’ve had someone with him all that time.

He’s finding it hard to breathe again.

“Five,” Klaus says again, putting his hands on his shoulders. Five does not shove him off, even as his throat feels tight. “We’re going to be fine. You need to relax.”

Five stares at him for a moment, at those bright green (alive) eyes, and considers talking to him. He could try and explain what’s going on with him, the long day he’s had or his experience at the Commission or how dangerously close he’s getting to feeling like everything happening is his fault.

“I’m plenty relaxed,” he says instead. Klaus sighs and takes his hands away. Five avoids his gaze, finding a new equation in his notebook and getting to work on that. There’s a strange kind of invisible weight on his chest.

“If you need anything, mi hermano- and I mean anything- you can talk to me, alright?” Klaus says. Five nods absently. Klaus seems to give up on getting him to talk and stands, patting his shoulder before he leaves.

Five picks up his glass, tipping the rest of the alcohol-soaked ice towards his mouth. The buzz makes his head spin, and he’s tempted to go get more from the bar, but the thought of his family being down there keeps him firmly planted on his bed.

He sets the glass aside, lays down for the second time today, and misses Delores.

He must have dozed off again, because when Five hears his door creak open later and opens his eyes, the light pouring in from the windows has dimmed significantly. That’s a shame.

Five closes his eyes again and listens intently as whoever opened the door creeps towards him. It’s not one of his brothers, then; there’s no reason any of them would try to be so quiet in their own room. Five shifts slightly, just enough to move his arm under his pillow, and continues feigning sleep. He closes his fingers around the handle of the knife he keeps under his pillow.

He told the Handler what feels like ages ago that he was done with killing, but that doesn’t mean he won’t protect himself if it comes down to it.

The intruder steps closer, floorboards creaking under their feet no matter how lightly they try and step. Five avoids visibly tensing up with all his might as they get closer and closer until he can hear them breathing above him. A hand brushes his shoulder, and-

Five jerks into action.

He sits up, whips the knife out, and presses it to where he thinks the intruder’s throat is in one smooth, fluid motion- and blinks the sleep from his eyes to find Lila staring at him, looking more annoyed than frightened even while frozen with the blade against her skin.

“Jesus Christ, you little turd.”

“Why would you sneak up on me like that?” He hisses, keeping the knife where it is for a moment. She puts a hand to the wrist by her neck and pushes him away.

“I was just trying not to wake you up. Do you assume everyone is out to get you? Because that would explain some things.”

“What do you want, Lila?” Five flips the knife closed and puts it back under his pillow.

“Family meeting. They asked me to get you,” she says, putting her hands in her pockets and looking around the room properly. “Man, this joint is… lame.”

“Why did they send you?” He asks. She shrugs.

“Been asking myself the same thing, squirt.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it, squirt. Are you coming?” She jerks a thumb towards the door. Five sighs, picking up his glass since he should return it to the bar while down there and then tucking his notebook into his pocket.

“Alright,” he says, hand going to straighten a tie and then remembering he doesn’t have one. “Let’s go.”

He and Lila make their way down the hall and into the elevator. It’s odd how familiar- almost comforting- her presence feels now, after the past couple weeks of them trying to kill each other. He doesn’t entirely trust Lila, but she’s predictable, and there’s safety in that. He also appreciates her leaving him alone with his dead self earlier, but he’ll die before he admits that out loud.

The group they find in the lobby is missing both Viktor and Allison, but everyone else is present- of the group that came from the 60s, anyway. Five returns his glass to the bar before finding a spot next to Klaus, who pats his head, apparently feeling some kind of protectiveness from earlier. Five shoves his hand away. The absolute last thing he needs is protection.

“Great, we’re all here,” Diego says. “So, Viktor is gone.”

“What?” Five says, looking at him. “How long has he been gone?”

“Not long. A couple hours, at most,” Diego shrugs. Five pinches the bridge of his nose. “Harlan is gone, too, so they’re probably together. No one saw them leave, but I don’t see where else Harlan would go.”

“Wonderful. So Viktor just didn’t wait for a vote on that one,” Five says. Lila raises a finger.

“Would he have listened to one anyway?”

“Maybe not,” Five says. Diego squints at the two of them, gaze flicking suspiciously from former assassin to former assassin, and Five doesn’t know what to do with that.

“So what now?” Luther asks. Five shrugs helplessly.

“My future self told me not to save the world, so.” He scratches his neck. “There is that.”

“Your what told you what?” Luther repeats. Five closes his eyes a moment and once again wishes for alcohol.

“It’s true. I was there,” Lila says, nodding like she’s wiser than she is.

“What does that even mean?”

“Not sure. He was missing an arm and had a weird tattoo though, so.” Five reaches for his pocket to get out the skin he cut off his older self, and quickly realizes that he left it in the suit jacket he’s no longer wearing. “Ah, shit.”

“He was also- barely breathing,” Lila tries to help. Or maybe she’s purposefully confusing all of them more. Five isn’t sure. “Until he stopped. Of course.”

“Wait, so you watched him die in front of you?” Diego asks. “Are you okay, man?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Five replies. “Circle of life.”

“Yeah, that’s what you said the last time you were hiding shit from us,” Diego mumbles, but not accusatively. Five glowers at him.

“We need to focus on Viktor,” he says, quick to change the subject. Almost nothing unsettles him more than attention being on him or how he’s doing.

“Do we, though?” Klaus asks, leaning his head on his hand. “I mean, he can take care of himself, even though he is a pretty little guy.”

“Would you rather let him roam free?” Lila asks, taking one of Diego’s knives and spinning it absently in her hand. Diego looks like he wants to protest but allows it.

“Well he is an adult,” Luther replies.

“But a small one.”

“Yes,” Luther says, looking at his brother. “Thank you, Klaus.”

Klaus nods kindly at him, although Five is sure he heard Luther’s lack of sincerity.

“So we’re just letting Viktor do whatever, then?” Five asks, folding his arms. There’s a moment of hesitation before they all respond at once.

“Yeah, pretty much-“

“Sounds about right-“

“I don’t see why not-“

Five sighs, but has no energy for fighting with them about this.

“Alright. Fine by me,” he says, getting wearily to his feet. He stretches for a moment and several of his joints crack.

“How do you manage to make your teenage body sound like an old man one?” Luther asks.

“Tell me and we’ll both know,” he replies. “I’m going to look around the hotel.”

“On your own? Stay safe,” Klaus says. “She’s a mystery, you know.”

“She’s an old, rundown building. I can handle it,” Five says. Klaus shrugs with a “Don’t say I didn’t warn you” kind of a look on his face.

If Five is being honest with himself, what he needs more than anything is a distraction. Whatever he finds down these corridors surely won’t cause him to start seeing his siblings as dead again, so it can’t hurt him.

Right?

Chapter Text

Obsidian is just as Five suspected: A perfectly ordinary, if somewhat creaky hotel. Klaus was so full of shit. He doesn’t know what he expected from the brother who managed to accidentally start a cult.

Five explores for a while anyway. Most of the doors he manages to get open are just various janitorial closets. He would try and explore more locked guest rooms by just jumping past the door, but the idea of walking in on something he doesn’t want to see keeps that option limited. Eventually he makes it to the top floor, however, and wonders what the view from the roof is.

It doesn’t take long for him to find a door that reads “STAIRS - STAFF ONLY BEYOND THIS POINT”, which he promptly ignores. He jumps through and finds himself at the bottom of a dank, dimly lit stairwell. Nearly every surface around him is far too grey and damp for his liking, but he heads up the stairs anyway, praying he doesn’t get anything too disgusting on his shoes.

The door at the top is unlocked, and Five says a silent thanks to whatever god exists that he doesn’t have to jump somewhere he can’t see again. He opens the door and steps out onto a roof that’s rather disappointing, if he’s being honest. There’s some vent fans and chimneys sticking out of the roof, but not much else. So much for a mystery.

Five heads over to the edge facing the city, shoving his hands in his pockets and looking out at it. The academy is out that way, the childhood home that apparently none of them can ever return to. God, he’d really screwed up on this one. And he thought flinging his siblings throughout Dallas was bad.

He’s aware he holds himself to ridiculously high standards; he has since he was a child, but he can’t help being frustrated with himself for this mishap. He should’ve realized that after that disaster of a dinner meeting their father was going to find different children; he should’ve known that the Harlan problem wasn’t going to be solved so easily. Although he guesses that doesn’t really have anything to do with the current apocalypse. Unless it does. It’s not like they’ll ever know now, not with Viktor running off with him.

Five is entirely lost in his head again, but at least this time it’s not related to his 45 years alone.

He allows himself another moment of quiet- or as quiet as the city gets- before he turns, heading back towards the staircase. Invisible to him, another Kugelblitz wave ripples out from the academy and reaches the outskirts of the hotel as he reaches the door inside- and then sucks itself harshly back in.

Five is nearly thrown off his feet by the receding surge and has to grab onto the door handle to steady himself. He glances out towards the front of the hotel, where the wave just stopped, before looking back where he’d been standing in the direction it came from. His heart stops for a second at the sight of buildings crumbling in on themselves as the wave retreats, no doubt also taking more people and animals with it.

Five runs back to the edge, squinting out at the focal point of the destruction. He can just barely make out the tip of the academy, or what he thinks must be the academy given the location of the Kugelblitz. He’s not completely sure, seeing as he spent far more time seeing that building when it was destroyed than when it was standing. 

Far more time indeed. Hours, days, of just digging through the rubble to try and find something important- some clue from one of his siblings as to how the hell this happened. Or how the hell he was supposed to survive the next four decades.

He should probably stop thinking about that now.

Five shakes himself, watching the aftermath of the damage for another moment before he decides to head back in. He traipses back down the (frankly, rather repulsive) stairs and jumps through the door again. Five takes the elevator to a random lower floor, deciding to see if any other rooms are unlocked. He only makes it a few steps off the elevator before he stops, a half-open door at the end of the hall catching his eye. Whatever is inside looks very… pink. 

Five moves over, pausing outside the door when he hears a voice. And a very familiar one, at that.

“-no one’s seen him in a while, and he’s been acting weird all day!” Diego sounds mad, but there’s an underlying tone of… some other emotion that Five can’t quite place.

“Yeah, but there’s no need to panic. I’m sure he’s just exploring like he said he was going to,” Klaus replies. Five realizes with a bit of a jolt that they’re talking about him. “Besides, do you really think this paradox thing can eat the stuff that caused it?”

“How the hell am I supposed to know? He would know that!” Comes Diego’s reply. Five blinks. No he would not. 

“Look, Diego, just calm down for a second, alright?” That’s Luther. 

“Well I’m sorry for being the only one concerned about this.”

“You’re not, it’s just-“ Luther sighs, and his voice lowers enough that Five has to strain to hear it. “He probably just wants some alone time after this morning. It seems like he needs it.”

Five’s chest aches. Does Luther really think “alone time” is the solution to his problems? After all the years of it he had? Then again, why is he always trying to tell himself that it’s what he needs either?

“Whatever, man. I still think we should look for him,” Diego says. Five clears his throat and pushes the door open.

“No need,” he says calmly, stepping in and shutting it behind him. All three of their heads snap towards him, relief immediately clear on Diego’s face. Luther’s and Klaus’s are similar, but there’s some worry mixed in as well.

“Five,” Diego acknowledges, sighing slightly and then glancing at the door behind him. “How much did you hear?”

“Enough,” Five replies. Klaus grimaces slightly. “I don’t know what this paradox can eat, by the way.”

“What are your feelings on the alone time?” Luther asks tentatively. Five fixes him with a glare for a moment and then just leaves his response at that.

“What is this place?” He asks, stepping further inside the room and looking around at the strange decor.

“This is where I died,” Klaus says, nodding a little. “Just this morning. Thanks to Diego’s delinquent son.”

“He’s actually not my son,” Diego mumbles. They all turn to him.

“What?” Luther asks.

“Yeah, Lila lied about it,” he says, rubbing his neck slightly. His brothers stare at him for a moment before Klaus speaks.

“That’s messed up, man.”

“Yeah,” Diego agrees, dropping his hand. “A little.”

“Maybe you can adopt him or something,” Luther says. Five steps around the room, frowning at the white buffalo on the wall. It seems like an oddly specific animal to mount, although he guesses he doesn’t know a lot about hunting. Well. In a way he does. 

“You think that would work?” Diego sounds like he’s seriously considering it. Five is about to tune out of this conversation. Although at least he managed to dodge it being focused on him again.

“I mean, just file some papers, how hard can it be, right?” Klaus says, gesturing with his hands a little. Five frowns at a little plinko machine on the wall, not hearing Diego’s response. Something about it looks… off. He walks over, reaching up and running his fingers along the top of the panel it’s on and stopping when he hits a gap between it and the wall.

Five moves to the left some, presses the tips of his fingers into the place where the gap feels the widest, and pulls. The panel pops open with a little clunk sound, revealing a bright, seemingly endless blue hallway that looks as if it’s made of glass on all sides. His brothers turn at the light.

“Finally, something interesting,” Five mumbles. 

“Woah…” Klaus comes over, standing next to him and peering into the tunnel. “Never knew that was up here.” 

“That’s probably the point,” Diego says as he and Luther follow Klaus. “Stanley must have unlocked it somehow.”

“That little rascal?” Klaus asks. Five wonders how he’d be talking about Stanley if he couldn’t come back from the dead. Except- he probably wouldn’t be talking much at all. His throat tightens for a moment at the thought.

“Should we go in?” Luther asks. Diego hums suspiciously.

“I dunno. I don’t like this.”

“Maybe we should just leave it be,” Five agrees. “For now, at least.”

“Well, when are we gonna come back to it? In a week, when the world is gone?” Luther asks. 

“I don’t know, Luther. Why don’t you figure out how to save everything for once?” Five snaps. He knows it’s unfair, especially given his rate of success with actually preventing an apocalypse, but it comes out anyway.

Luther opens his mouth to reply with something that would probably be just as mean, but seems to think twice and shakes his head instead.

“Nope. Not doing this with you today, Five.”

“Whatever,” Five mutters, rolling his eyes. A slight skittering sound comes from the floor and Five looks down to see a cockroach coming out of the tunnel. Klaus pulls a face as it crawls down the little section of wall between the panel opening and the room and drops onto the hardwood. 

“Gross,” Diego mutters, turning and stomping on it with his foot. He turns back to shut the panel before any more can get out and finds his smaller brother staring at the cockroach with a far-away look in his eyes. “Five?”

Five is gone. Lost. Pulled back to his fifth year in the apocalypse, when he finally accepted that he couldn’t live off the few canned preserves left on the planet anymore. He still remembers the first time he ate a bug. He’d managed to trap one under an empty can, even with his weak reflexes and complete lack of any muscle. He was practically skin and bones then, and he should’ve been with his family, fighting crime or playing games or getting through one of their long, awkward dinners and instead he was here, about to eat what could be the last life on the planet besides himself. 

Cockroaches tasted absolutely horrible. Five had always prided himself on his stomach before the apocalypse, on how much gore and filth he could handle. He discovered during it that he didn’t have anywhere near as much strength as he thought. He had to force cockroaches down his throat sometimes, fighting his gag reflex the whole way down- and that was only half the battle. For a long, long time after that first cockroach, it would take about all of his strength to not throw everything back up when he ate one. 

He doesn’t at all notice his brothers trying to get his attention. Or that they’ve been doing so for the past minute. 

“Five. Come on, man.” Diego’s voice is tight with worry as he cups the back of his brother's head in his hands. He doesn’t want to startle him, but he needs to snap out of it. Diego hates that glassy look in his eyes. It’s not a look he wants to see on any of his siblings faces, but the fact that Five looks thirteen is making it ten times worse for some reason.

“Earlier yelling his name a few times worked,” Klaus says quietly. He and Luther have moved to flank Diego, all three of them staring worriedly at their little- no, older- brother.

“Earlier?” Diego echoes. Klaus sighs.

“Yeah,” he says, with no further explanation. He moves closer and snaps his fingers in Five’s face a few times. No response.

“It’s like he’s just stuck,” Luther says. “Have you ever seen him like this?”

“Not this bad,” Diego replies. “Do you think Allison did something to him?”

“Like what?” Luther asks. Diego shrugs.

“I don’t know, she’s clearly figured out some kind of new rumor shit.”

“We should take him to the couch,” Klaus suggests. They give him similarly confused looks. “What, you got any better ideas?”

“I guess not,” Luther admits, reaching down to pick him up. Diego waves him off.

“I can do it.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah,” he mumbles, crouching down and putting an arm under Five’s legs, the other around his back. He scoops him up like a princess, steadying himself for a moment with the weight before he finds his balance. “Yep, he’s scrawny, I got it.”

“He sure is,” Luther snorts, following Diego over to the couch. “He’s got bruises all over him, too.”

“Bruises? What bruises?” Klaus asks. 

“He didn’t say,” Luther shrugs. “Brushed me off about it, actually.”

“Yeah, he does that,” Klaus sighs, sitting on the couch across from the one Diego carefully lays Five down on. He straightens up, looking down at him. Five is clearly breathing still, albeit slower than usual, but he isn’t in the room with them at all.

“Now it just looks creepy with him staring like that,” he says. Creepy isn’t really the word for how this feels to him. Unsettling, maybe. Frightening.

“It can’t last forever,” Luther says, sitting on the third couch. 

“I dunno, he is pretty stubborn,” Klaus counters from across the room. Diego shakes his head a little, folding his arms and pacing away.

“There has to be something we can do.”

“We might just have to let it wear off,” Klaus says. Diego shakes his head again, looking at Five as he walks circles into the floor.

“I don’t think he’s doing well.”

“I don’t think he’s been doing well all day,” Luther says, meeting Diego’s eyes with that stern-older-brother-look he used to do so often. Diego holds it for a moment before he just sighs and turns away. 

Behind him, Five blinks a little and then sits bolt upright, looking around at them and then down at the couch. Klaus looks over and straightens up immediately.

“Five…” He says, a little bit of warning in his voice. Diego turns back at this. The last thing any of them want is for Five to panic.

Five meets Klaus’s eyes and disappears in a flash of blue.

“Shit,” Diego says, but is immediately cut off by Five reappearing under the white buffalo mount, stumbling slightly as he lands.

“Five, come on, you don’t have to jump away,” Luther says, reaching out a hand for him. Five glares at him.

“Just leave me alone,” he says, clenching his fists and looking towards the panel at the wall. Diego realizes what he’s about to do a second too late.

“Wait, don’t- Five-!” He moves towards him and Five jumps again. Diego’s arms close around thin air and he turns to see where he’ll reappear next- to no avail.

Five makes it at least halfway down the hall behind the panel, losing his balance when he lands this time. He hits the ground hard and winces as he lands on his bruised arm, a slight noise of pain leaving him. The walls, which seem a lot tighter than they did from the outside, look like they’re closing in on him for a second. He glances behind him and can see the distant light of the room he just left- and can just barely hear his brothers bickering again. He rolls his eyes and picks himself up, taking a moment to let his head (mostly) stop spinning before he sets off in the opposite direction.

Whatever is at the end of this hall can’t be as bad as talking about his feelings, after all.

Five gets to another door after what seems like hours but is probably closer to a few minutes. He hesitates before he opens it, glancing back again. Maybe it’s not the best idea to go in here all by himself. He doesn’t know what’s waiting on the other side, and his powers are already feeling a little drained.

But what’s the other option? Going back to his brothers and having them all crowd him? He’s fine; he’s dealt with the kind of spacing out they’re all concerned over before, but it doesn’t seem like they’ll understand that. And besides, he’s already screwed up and taken his family to this messed up timeline. Maybe whatever is behind this door will help their situation. Redeem him in the eyes of his siblings (or maybe just Allison) if he figures it out. In which case he absolutely needs to handle it himself.

Five takes a deep breath, and steps into Oblivion. 

Chapter Text

Klaus is getting very tired of his brothers’ bickering.

“You know what, Luther? Just because you happened to find a girlfriend and no longer have a care in the world-“

“Don’t even start with that, of course I’m worried about Five. And you’re one to talk about finding a girlfriend and forgetting about everything else.”

“Don’t talk about Lila like that.”

“Don’t talk about Sloane like that!”

“Would you both just shut up?” Klaus groans, having thrown himself across one of the fuzzy couches after the initial panic over Five. “This is getting us nowhere.”

“Oh, and what would you have us do? I don’t see you trying to look for him,” Diego replies, jabbing a finger at Klaus. Luther sighs.

“Klaus is right.”

“What was that?” Klaus sits up. “Can I get that on a recording?”

“No. We need to figure out where he went,” Luther says. “He shouldn’t be wandering around by himself with the state he’s in right now.”

“New York?” Klaus mumbles. His brothers both ignore him. 

“Fine,” Diego grumbles. “If that’s the plan- then he probably went down there,” he gestures to the panel in the wall. Luther blinks at him.

“What? Why do you think that?”

“Because I saw him glance towards it before he jumped away,” Diego says. Luther stares at him in disbelief for a moment, and Klaus can practically see his fuse shortening. He sits up as a precaution.

“And you only thought to mention this now?”

“Exactly, Luther, I agree, arguing really does hold us back!” Klaus hastily interrupts before Diego can go off as well. He swings his legs off of the couch, getting clumsily to his feet and brushing himself off. “So let’s all just go after him, huh?” 

“Should we get the others?” Diego asks, looking like he’s restraining himself from lunging at Luther. “We don’t know what’s down there.”

“We don’t have time to get the others,” Luther says. Diego snorts. “What?”

“You sound like Five,” he replies, then frowns to himself. “Why do I miss that little shit?”

“Because he’s your brother,” Klaus says, patting him on the back as he walks over to the open panel. He pokes his head into the tunnel, squinting at the brightness. “Are you sure we wouldn’t have seen him appear in here?”

“Maybe not if he jumped far enough down,” Luther shrugs. “I think we have to check there in any case.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” Klaus says. “I’m not sure any of us were looking over here when he jumped anyway.”

“He’s pretty fast sometimes,” Diego agrees, leaning with one hand on the top of the panel. 

“Yeah, fast at getting hurt,” Luther scoffs. “And then refusing to take care of it.”

“Well, what is he supposed to do with bruises?” Klaus says. “Put a bandaid on them?”

“I don’t know. He doesn’t have to pretend like they don’t matter though,” Luther replies. “There was also the, uh- weird looking wound on his side.”

“What’re you talking about?” Diego asks, frowning at his bigger brother. Luther shrugs.

“I don’t know what it was from. It was just all- stitched up, really neatly, but it clearly hadn’t been watched since then and it didn’t look good. On his right side,” he says, pointing to the spot on himself. Diego’s eyes widen.

“The shrapnel,” he mumbles. They both turn to him.

“The what?” Klaus echoes. Diego looks between the two of them.

“You guys don’t know about that?”

“How the hell would we?” Luther asks incredulously. Klaus wonders if he’s actually mad at Diego, or mad at himself for missing another thing with Five.

“When he came back from the Commission, and gave that whole speech on saving the world and how our family is insane so we all needed to just listen to him? And he landed right on the bar and scared the shit out of all of us?” Diego explains. “When this timeline still had the Umbrella Academy? And we didn’t know Viktor could do all that shit yet?”

“Yeah…” Klaus nods. “What’s your point?”

“It was then. He got injured blowing up the Commission,” Diego says. “He passed out in the middle of our investigation at Jenkins’ house and we had to get him back to Mom before he bled all over the place.”

“Seriously?” Luther asks. “And he just never mentioned it to anyone?”

Diego looks down the tunnel. Klaus follows his gaze. There’s nothing but endless blue and whiteness, completely disguising what might be waiting on the other side.

“Of course he didn’t,” Diego says quietly. There’s a moment of tense silence before he straightens up. “We need to find him.”

“Let’s go then,” Luther says. Klaus steps up first, looking back at his brothers. 

“You should probably take up the rear, Luther,” he says. Luther rolls his eyes but nods.

“Yeah, yeah, I will.”

“Just because you can really block someone’s vision if you’re in front of them, you know-“

“I got it,” Luther says. Klaus steps further in and Diego sticks close behind him. Luther manages to get in, although it’s a tighter squeeze than he’s expecting. He glances behind himself with difficulty.

“Should we close the door?” He asks. Klaus looks back, and then looks to Diego for the decision. Diego shrugs.

“Just leave it open. In case we need to get out fast,” he says. This does nothing to lower the apprehension all three of them are feeling right now. 

Klaus sighs, and starts forward through the hall with his brothers on his tail.

Five is not a fan of the parallel White Buffalo suite.

It doesn’t take him long to realize that the room is different, at least. He sees the mount of the other end of the buffalo on the wall almost as soon as he steps out of the hall, and he’s looking at the Japanese decor when the panel slams shut ten feet away from him. Not creepy at all. At least that should lower the chances of his family coming after him. 

The lighting in the suite is… different, in a way he can’t quite place. Colder. For some reason that chills him more than anything. He’s never liked white lights. They remind him of the medical wing of the Commission, with all its doctors in perfect blue scrubs and clipped voices going over everything wrong with him like he’s not even there on the table. 

Five supposes it makes sense that the passage just leads to an alternate version of Hotel Obsidian instead of… God knows what else. But who would build a place like this? And for what purpose? He decides the only way to find out is by exploring the rest of it. 

He leaves the suite with a little more eagerness than he’d care to admit and heads down the hall. This hotel seems very quiet, if nothing else. He wonders if there are more people in the lobby as he finds the elevator.

The answer seems to be no. The lobby and ground floor is also a weird replica of the hotel he came from, but it’s entirely empty, except for him. Flute music plays from somewhere, and there is a rotating sushi bar, but Five can’t figure out who could have placed the food there given how fresh it all seems. 

He finds himself wondering if he’s stepped inside a parallel universe, or just some kind of… weird portal located in the hall. He knows better than anyone that the laws of space are malleable, but who can bend them besides him? Lila, if she’s mimicking him, he guesses, but he highly doubts she has anything to do with this backwards place.

Five considers trying the sushi before deciding he has more important things to figure out right now. He should have enough fuel for the time being anyway. He approaches the front desk, where that greasy Brit Klaus seems so fond of usually is- he thinks Chet is his name- and finds only a bell and a sign next to it in mostly Japanese. He leans forward, squinting at the print at the top of the card.

Hotel Oblivion.

Five blinks, pulling back slightly and looking around as if he’s going to find some kind of explanation for this. Oblivion. His older- now dead- self’s words echo in his mind.

This is what you have coming.

Five suddenly feels much more on edge.

He turns towards the doors at the entrance of the hotel. Maybe there’s a world outside of there- somewhere he can find answers about this place. He strides towards one, pushing through the revolving glass- and is spat back out on the other side. He frowns, glancing at the door he just went in before turning and trying it again. The same thing happens. 

Five steps back, clenching his hands into fists and trying to simply jump through the outer wall of the hotel. His power sputters and burns to life at his fingertips- he doesn’t move. Five narrows his eyes, trying as hard as he can to pull the fabric of space apart in the way that normally comes so easily to him. But it’s like there’s just a wall on the other side. He can pull things apart from his end, but there’s nowhere to come out where he’s trying to go. 

He relaxes his hands, letting his power die and looking with defeat at the wall. This building is all there is.

Five strides back over to the counter, looking at the sign again. His Japanese is rusty at best, but he can make out “Do not” and “Bell”. Probably “Do not ring bell”, then, since it seems to be an instruction for guests. That’s odd. What’s the point of a bell being there in the first place if no one is supposed to ring it?

He’s gotten himself in trouble not listening to directions before, though, so Five tables ringing the bell as a last resort. His problem for the moment seems to be that he’s trapped here. All by himself. How familiar. 

Five goes over to the bar and grabs a plate of maki sushi off of it along with a pair of chopsticks. He heads back to the elevators as he picks up the first piece. He might as well explore the rest of this place, since the lobby is so unhelpful. 

Five steps onto the elevator as he takes his first bite, entirely unaware of his brothers making their way through the tunnel above him.

It is a disorienting journey, to say the least.

Klaus has never felt so dizzy just from walking through a tunnel in all his life. The walls seem to spin and close in around him. He can’t imagine how this would be after just completely zoning out for minutes on end. They really need to find Five.

He can hear Luther’s occasional grunts from behind Diego as he keeps bumping into the walls, which is really not helping Klaus’s stress levels. He doesn’t blame him for not being able to walk straight, though; this passage has to feel even tighter for him. In any case, it is a relief when Klaus gets to the panel on the other side and shoves it open, stumbling downwards into a starkly lit room which for a moment looks just like the one they came from. Diego and Luther fill in behind him, Luther closing the panel and looking around.

“What the hell?” He mumbles. Klaus shrugs, spotting the rear end of the buffalo on the wall and reaching a very intelligent conclusion about this room.

“It’s like some kind of… weird… replica,” he says. Diego rolls his eyes, going over and looking at some of the snacks on a table in the room.

“Yeah, thanks, genius,” he mutters, going through the food for a moment. Klaus looks around before he spots the door, which is wide open already. 

“I think our beloved Cinco has been here already,” he says, walking over to the door. Diego and Luther look over, seeming to make the same connection at about the same rate. 

“We better go find him then,” Diego says, ever the wannabe hero. He shoves past Klaus through the doorway, heading out into the hallway and looking around. “Five!” He yells.

“He’s probably not even on this floor, genius," Luther echoes, leaving the room after him. Klaus follows behind, deciding to leave the door to the room open- maybe because that’s what Five seemed to think best. “We should take the elevators.”

“We need to split up and look for him,” Diego says, heading down the hall. 

“That’s not a good idea, Diego, we don’t know this place,” Luther calls after him. Diego throws up his hands.

“How hard can it be?”

“Famous last words!” Luther yells back. Klaus can feel another argument brewing already. What is with these two?

“How about we all at least head to the lobby together?” He suggests, speed walking after Diego. His brother snorts, pulling a knife out of the holster he always seems to be wearing.  

“I can take care of my own damn self.”

“This isn’t about you, Diego. We’re all looking for Five,” Luther says, bringing up the rear yet again. “Can you just try and be a team player for once?”

Diego looks back at him, finger hovering over the elevator button, before he sighs and presses it.

“Fine. But if I do a perimeter assessment and decide it’s best to split up, we split up.”

“Whatever,” Luther says, which is as close to an agreement as Klaus thinks they’re going to get. The elevator dings as it opens and all three of them step on. Klaus hits the button for the lobby and looks around the car. It’s very similar to the one he was reanimated in not too long ago, if not the same.

He sees Diego looking at him out of the corner of his eye for a moment before he stops, clearing his throat a little. If Klaus didn’t know any better, he would say there’s some anxiety hidden in those stony features of his. Maybe he’s scared of finding another brother dead today- especially one who can’t just come back.

Klaus takes a deep breath, and braces himself for whatever is waiting at the end of their ride.

The elevator takes Five to the third floor with only a bit of complaint, shuddering slightly before it comes to a stop. He steps off it, looking around and deciding that this floor looks… exactly the same as the one the suite was on. Very exciting. 

Five heads off down the hall, setting his chopsticks on his plate for a moment and trying the knob of one of the rooms. It swings open easily, making him frown. Odd. The inside looks just like the room he shares with his brothers (save for Viktor) back at the hotel- albeit without the sheets messed up and clothes thrown everywhere. 

Five steps in further, picking up his chopsticks and taking another bite of sushi. If nothing else, his family might be able to camp out in this strange, empty hotel. There’s no one to make them pay for rooms, there’s free food downstairs even if it is all sushi- although the lack of staff means there’s no one to clean anything either. Maybe not the best idea then, given Klaus’s apt description of Diego and Luther as “barn animals”.

He looks around the room, squinting curiously at the windows. If there’s nothing outside the hotel, then how is there light coming through the curtains? And isn’t it too late in the day for it to be so bright out anyway? This place seems to be raising more questions than it’s answering. 

Five finishes his sushi and sets the plate down on one of the beds, walking back out of the room. He stops outside the door a second and reconsiders leaving the plate there. Maybe it’s not wise to make it obvious where he’s been, as empty as this hotel seems. But when he goes back into the room to retrieve the plate- it’s completely gone. 

Five glances around the room as if someone would’ve moved it to a different surface. He swears he just set it down. Is he losing track of time again? It takes a couple minutes of searching the room before he gives up and leaves again, walking down the hallway towards the elevators. He pauses at a number on the wall. 5.

Didn’t he get off on the third floor?

Five looks back at the room he came from. That would explain the plate’s disappearance, if it’s a different room than the one he set the plate down in. But here he is again with someone- or something- besides him bending the rules of space. It’s unnerving, to say the least. 

Five goes back to the elevators, and punches the button for a higher floor.

“I’m not seeing Five,” are the first words out of Luther’s mouth when they make it onto the lower deck of the lobby. Klaus, unfortunately, has to agree with him. The somewhat eerie Japanese theme has continued on this level, but there is no sign of their time traveling brother.

“Maybe he isn’t here,” Diego says, putting his hands on his hips and scanning the area. “This is a waste of time.”

“Would some sushi help?” Klaus asks, gesturing to the rotating bar. Diego looks over.

“Maybe.”

“Hey…” Luther walks over to the bar, scratching his head some. “Is it just me, or is there one missing?”

“What do you mean?” Diego asks as he follows, Klaus right behind him.

“Wait a second…” Luther holds up his hand and then points as the dishes circle around again. “There,” he says, gesturing to an empty spot in the lineup. “Like somebody took one.”

“He is here,” Diego mumbles, looking at the ceiling as if he can just see through it and find Five. “Or at least someone is.”

“Does Five like sushi?” Klaus asks. Luther shrugs.

“I don’t know. Probably.”

“How do we not know what our own brother likes?” Klaus wonders, more to himself than either of them. Diego looks back at the two of them.

“Alright. I think we should split up.”

“I didn’t see much of a perimeter assessment,” Luther points out. Diego shakes his head.

“I got what I need from here.”

“Fine. But if there’s some hidden danger lurking around one of these corners- and one of us gets hurt-“ Luther gestures around them. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“Right. Just yell if you’re, uh. In trouble,” Diego says, walking off towards the upper deck. Klaus stares after him and then turns to Luther.

“Is it just me, or do you get the feeling this isn’t going to go well?”

“It’s not just you.”

Five gets very sick of this game very quickly. Explore a mysterious hotel, they said. It’ll be fun, they said. Well, technically no one told him to do this, but he’s going to complain anyway. Being spat out on random floors is entertaining for about three minutes before it gets very tiresome. 

At some point Five swears he hears footsteps on the same floor as him, but when he turns around a corner and ends up two floors lower they disappear. Which is fine. He’s probably imagining things anyway. That wouldn’t be unusual.

He does end up back on the third floor at some point, and manages to find his plate in the same place he left it. He deems his new mission returning it to the lobby, just in case he’s not hearing things and someone else really is in the hotel with him. He makes it to the elevators, although not without being put on the fifth again, and hits the down button.

“Five?”

Five looks up at the sound of his name being called, glancing around. There is no one to be seen. The voice sounds like Klaus though.

“Five!”

There it is again. It sounds like it’s coming from above him. Five isn’t sure if he’s absolutely hallucinating now or if his brothers managed to make it through the panel after him. But how could they figure out he came here in the first place? 

Whether real or fake, Five’s brothers are still the last people he wants to see right now. At least not until he can tell them he’s figured something out. Maybe then they’ll stop fretting over him.

His name isn’t called again anyway. Five steps onto the elevator as it dings open and lets the door close behind him.

Thankfully, the elevator takes him down to the lobby without a hitch. He steps off it and returns to the sushi bar, considering for a moment before he just sets his plate in the spot where he found it, unsure what else to do with it. The first floor is just as empty as when he was last down here, and there’s no sign that anyone else has been here.

He strolls towards the doors, observing the light streaming through them this time. Just like the windows upstairs. He makes a mental note of the artificial sun, or whatever it might be, and turns around just as a cockroach skitters across his path. 

Five stares for a second, and then promptly turns and vomits at least half of his sushi into the nearest potted plant.

He coughs slightly as he comes up, clutching at his stomach. There goes some of his fuel. At least he didn’t mentally check out this time- although throwing up might not be a better reaction. In any case, he needs to figure out what this hotel’s deal is and leave before something else sets either his brain or his acid reflex off. 

Five looks over at the front desk as he wipes his mouth off. So far, he has found nothing helpful on the floors above besides a teleportation labyrinth that seems like it was designed to confuse guests more than anything. He’s gotten one explicit instruction since entering this hotel, and that was to not ring the bell. Why? Because it’ll destroy the hotel, destroy the portals above, destroy the person who rings it?

Or because it’s the only way to get any real answers?

He strides over and hits the bell.

The lights above him dim and shift, most of them going out and alternate bulbs switching on in sickly shades of gold. The flute music cuts out as Five looks around. A low and rumbling breathing sound, far too deep to be human, seems to come from every direction. Heavy footsteps that he also can’t place accompany it.

Five starts towards the elevators, stopping in the middle of the lobby. Does he need to kill something, to figure out what this place is? He can do that, even if he’d prefer not to. He turns in a slow circle, trying to triangulate the source of the noises surrounding him.

A clink of chains sounds from behind him, and Five spins just in time to see a sickle cutting through the air towards him. He reels back a second before it would’ve sliced clean through his arm. Instead- it gashes his stomach open. 

There’s a sharp scream, and it takes Five a moment to register that it comes from him.

He presses his hands over the wound and clenches his teeth against a noise of pain, trying to suffocate the blood flow as he stares at the approaching figure. It’s already swinging its chain to prepare another blow. Whatever it is is tall, dark, menacing, and clearly heavily armed. Five decides through the quickly forming haze in his brain that he cannot fight this thing right now. Given that he just vomited most of his food up, he has enough fuel left for maybe one jump before either his power or his consciousness gives. 

He needs to make it count.

Diego knows it’s Five as soon as he hears the scream. That’s one thing they have going for them; Five is in such a young body that it’s easy to pick his voice out from his siblings, even when he’s in pain. Especially when he’s in pain. 

That’s about the only thing they have going for them. 

Diego has entirely lost Klaus and Luther, and is starting to come to terms with the fact that splitting up may not have been the best decision. This is primarily because the upper levels are a lot more confusing than any of them initially realized. Although he’s not 100% sure, Diego could swear the floors keep switching up on him. The unsettling yellow lights that have flickered on overhead aren’t helping his anxiety. And now he needs to find Five, but isn’t sure how to get to wherever he is.

So he follows his first instinct, which is to book it towards the elevators.

Diego jams the down button about ten times in rapid succession when he gets there, then steps away when the arrow lights up. He has rarely been this panicked in his life. The level of nerves he’s feeling is comparable to when they came in on Allison bleeding out on the floor of that damn cabin- or those last few moments with Ben. Neither of which is the thing to be thinking about right now. He shakes out his hands, taking a deep breath and steeling himself to go fight whatever is attacking Five.

The elevator door opens with a polite ding, and it takes Diego a second to comprehend the sight of Five right there on the floor, a pool of blood quickly forming under him.

“Oh my god- Five,” he gasps, his mouth unsticking as he rushes forward, dropping to his knees next to him. Five blinks slowly up at him as if he’s not gushing blood all over the floor. Diego tries to stop his hands shaking as he presses them to the slice through his brother’s abdomen. “Five, can you hear me? Five!”

“Diego,” Five mumbles, so quiet Diego barely catches it. He looks up to find his brothers green eyes shifting lazily towards the elevator buttons. Diego follows his gaze to find blood smeared all over the pad, mostly on the button for the 4th floor. The doors close on them and Diego looks back.

“What? What is it, Five?”

“Don’t go… lobby,” he manages to get out, gaze flicking lethargically back to Diego- who doesn’t have time to respond before his eyelids start drooping.

“What? Five, what does that mean? Who attacked you?” Diego asks desperately, reaching up and shaking him. Five’s eyes slip closed. “Five!”

His brother doesn’t move. Diego swears, moving his hands back to his stomach and trying desperately to stop the blood flow.

“Shit- Klaus!” He yells at the top of his lungs as the elevator drops. “Luther!”

If there’s a response, he doesn’t hear it.

Luther barely ducks in time to avoid an axe going through his head. 

“Shit- who the hell taught you manners?” He barks over his shoulder at the masked man attacking him. Klaus hovers awkwardly behind him, and although Luther is glad he didn’t split up with his brother, he’s not currently helping a whole lot.

“I don’t think he’s going to respond, Luther!”

“Goddamnit-" Luther hisses, ducking a swing from his assailant and sending a blow into his middle, which is a bad decision as it’s covered by a metal plate. He comes away with a very sore fist, wringing his hand out a little. If it weren’t for his strength that probably would have shattered something. The man- thing- whatever- doesn’t seem to have even felt it.

“Klaus, does this thing have a weak spot?” Luther yells, catching the next punch in one hand before it can hit him and kicking the attacker in the stomach. He’s knocked a few feet back, which is good enough for Luther; his current goal is to keep him from reaching the axe now embedded in the wall a few feet away. 

“Not that I can see!” 

Luther sighs. He’s quickly remembering everything he hated about being a leader when he was young.

“Alright, listen- when I count to 3, we’re going to run for the elevators, all right?” He says, parrying another blow as the thing runs for him again.

“Are you sure we’ll make it?”

“No! Do you have a better idea?!” He yells. “I don’t know how to kill this thing!”

“Have you tried throwing it?”

“I can’t block it long enough to do that!” He shouts. The conversation while engaged in hand-to-hand combat isn’t his favorite thing either. “And what makes you think that’ll work?”

“I don’t know!”

“Okay then! On the count of 3, ready, 1…”

“I don’t know which way the elevators are, Luther!”

“Behind you! 2…”

“How are you going to get past him fast enough?”

“I’ll be fine, just go! 3!” He shouts, and dodges past the final swing of his attacker to sprint down the hallway after Klaus. He catches up to him easily and glances back, seeing the thing move and grab its axe out of the wall.

“Shit, we don’t have time for this- sorry in advance.”

“Sorry for what- woah!” Klaus practically yelps as Luther scoops him up, swinging him over his back in a fireman’s carry. “Luther!”

“I said sorry!” He yells, making it to the end of the hall and turning around the corner to the elevators. He runs and slams the up button as the axe flips through the air behind them and lands in the wall again. A few seconds later and that could’ve been Klaus’s head. 

“Luther, where are we going?”

“Out of this crazy place!” Luther replies, gaze flicking between the elevator’s changing numbers and the end of the hall they just came from. The door opens just as their attacker steps into the light and Luther rushes into the elevator, tapping the button for the next floor up rapidly. He presses himself against the wall as footsteps charge towards them, and the axe comes flying through the air right at his face. The door slides shut just in time for the handle to hit it and bounce off, falling to the floor with a clatter. Luther lets out a breath as the door closes peacefully and the car jerks upwards.

“Are we dead yet?” Klaus groans from his shoulder. Luther rolls his eyes and sets him down.

“Not yet.”

“Oh good,” he mumbles, rubbing his eyes. He blinks at the light shining down on them before he picks himself up. “Where do you think Five is?”

“Not sure,” Luther says. “Hopefully Diego got to him.”

The elevator slides reluctantly open as it reaches the 4th floor and Luther exits, Klaus following him and looking warily around. There’s no darkly clothed attacker in sight, though. 

“Come on,” Luther mumbles, gesturing with his head down the hall. Behind him, the other elevator dings quietly open and they both turn.

“Five- shit, come on, please-“ Diego’s voice is desperate, almost cracking as he pats their brother’s cheek, and it’s the first part Luther processes of the scene in front of them. Klaus sucks in a breath through his teeth as he takes in all the blood underneath Five, who is slumped against the wall like he’s taking a nap. Or dead. 

“Diego-“

“He’s not w- w- waking up,” Diego stammers, looking up at them. Scratch everything Luther already complained about. This is the part he hates about being the leader.

“Can you pick him up? We need to go,” he says, ignoring the way his stomach twists at the idea of moving Five, who already looks fragile enough as it is. Diego swallows slightly and nods, very carefully slipping his arms under Five and picking him up the same way he did earlier. He gets to his feet much less steadily, managing not to slip on the blood and making it out of the elevator.

“There’s a guy in here- trying to kill us, Luther-“

“There’s more than one,” Luther says, leading the way down the hall. Diego holds Five tightly to his chest as he follows, Klaus bringing up the rear and silent for once.

“What? How do you know?”

“Because we fought one too,” Luther says, pushing the door to the suite open the rest of the way. He lets his brothers through before he hastily shuts and locks it, not sure if these things can follow them or not. “Klaus, get the panel.”

“On it,” he says, rushing over and pulling it open. Luther presses his back against the door as Diego enters first, nearly bumping into the wall with Five’s feet but managing to avoid it by putting his head more on his shoulder as he runs off. Klaus steps in, looking back at Luther, who grimaces as the door he’s against is slammed into from the other side.

“Luther-“

“Go. I’ll be right behind you,” he says. Klaus hesitates, looking indecisive before he turns and follows Diego in a sprint. Luther takes a deep breath and steels himself. He’s sure he only has seconds before whatever is on the other side of the door decides to use its weapon to get in.

He counts down to 3, 2, 1 and makes a run for it.

Chapter Text

After many years, the apocalypse is quiet. 

That’s one thing Five can appreciate about it, even if it’s the only thing. For the first few years of his stay in the future, it seemed that there was always a fire burning somewhere nearby, or a building crumbling within a mile, or harsh winds whistling right past his ears. But eventually the dust settled, and he and Delores became the only things really making a sound on the entire planet. It made it a lot easier to think.

Yet there are still mornings, like today, when he feels like something in his head just isn’t working properly. 

“You’re tired, Five,” Delores tells him when he mentions it to her. Five sits back in his chair slightly, looking up at the bright sky. Exhaustion feels so constant these days.

“Maybe,” he replies anyway. “I don’t think I slept right.”

“I told you that mattress wouldn’t be good for your back,” she says, not unkindly. Five snorts.

“There are limited options out here. You’re lucky; you don’t have to sleep laying down the way I do,” he says. Delores gives a slight hum in response, and he looks over at her. “What?”

“Well, you don’t have to sleep here at all,” she says, giving him a small smile. Five tilts his head.

“What do you mean?”

“You’ll get it,” she replies. “Hopefully sooner than later.”

Five isn’t entirely satisfied with that answer, but he lets it go for the time being. He stretches a hand out in front of him, flexing his fingers a little before he frowns and brings them closer. When did his skin lose all its wear and wrinkles? Five turns his hand to inspect his palm and then looks down at his stomach. He pats his hands over the shirt he’s wearing, feeling his torso. Another question: when did he get so scrawny?

“Delores, do I look any different?” He asks, standing up. There’s no mirror handy, so she’ll have to do. She shrugs at him, a coy smile playing on her lips. That’s even more concerning. Delores isn’t one to keep things from him.

“You look like you did the last time I saw you,” she replies. Five frowns, feeling his arms. Also thinner than he thinks they’re supposed to be. There’s an absence of weight on his face as well, and he rubs his chin apprehensively. It’s smooth enough that it feels like he never had facial hair- or the capability to grow any.

“Maybe this is some kind of long-term side effect of time travel,” he says, moving to grab his sibling’s book and a pen. He flips through it, looking at some of the equations. “I never considered it affecting my physical form years later, but it’s all so theoretical…”

He shakes his head, jotting down notes in the margins of a page near the middle. There’s very little space left, but he squeezes it in somehow. He looks up to find Delores smiling at him again, with a look that indicates Five is being very amusing today.

“Do we have any more of that wine?” He asks her, deciding not to give in to whatever question she wants him to ask instead. Delores responds with something quite unrelated.

“Which body do you prefer?” She asks. Five frowns, looking down at himself again.

“I don’t know,” he replies honestly. “I feel shorter, currently, but younger. So that could be beneficial for moving quickly, if I ever need to. At the same time-“ He wrinkles his nose. “This isn’t me.”

“Technically it is. Just a younger you,” Delores points out. Five chuckles dryly.

“That version of me is long gone,” he says. Delores tilts her head. 

“Maybe. Maybe not,” she says, which is really not all that clear or helpful, in Five’s opinion. “Either way- your older body certainly was taller. Might’ve been able to take that blow to the legs, instead of the stomach.”

Five gives her a confused look. Suddenly his head is beginning to hurt.

“What blow?”

Klaus thinks he’s a lot better at running than many people give him credit for. He learned a few things in Vietnam. Hand-to-hand combat, no, fighting with knives or really anything besides artillery weapons, no, but running? That he can handle.

It’s coming in handy now, as he sprints down the hall after Diego. Walking through this head trip was bad enough; running makes him feel like he’s going to hurl. Diego makes it through the door and gets out of the way, letting Klaus jump out after him. He turns to find Luther further behind than he should be.

“Luther, hurry!” He yells, his brother glancing behind him as he runs. He storms through the door a few seconds later and slams it shut, pressing his back against it. Diego and Klaus watch nervously as the sound of footsteps comes from beyond the door.

Luther grimaces as the panel is slammed into from the other side, but his weight holds it shut. There’s another BANG, and another, before a low grumble of mirth comes from the other side and the footsteps retreat.

Luther slumps slightly in relief, taking a deep breath and looking up at the ceiling as if in prayer. Klaus returns his attention to the sibling clutched in Diego’s arms.

“What happened to him?” He asks, hurriedly stepping over and looking at Five. The gash in his stomach has not stopped bleeding, but Klaus is unsure how deep it is. Diego swallows, laying him down carefully on one of the couches and dropping to his knees beside him. 

“I don’t know,” he responds, hastily untucking Five’s shirt and rolling it up, careful not to get any of the fabric stuck to the wound. “I just found him like this, in the elevator- and I nearly got us killed again by letting it drop to the lobby where that fucking- chain weapon guy was-“

“You didn’t do this, Diego,” Luther says in a voice much steadier than his brother’s, moving away from the wall. Diego takes in a shaky breath and nods slightly, trying to return to his usual stoic look. His eyes don’t leave Five. “We need to get him to a hospital.”

“Can we?” Klaus asks. “Take him to a hospital, I mean? He looks like a child, he doesn’t have any legal records- I just feel like it’s going to raise some questions.” Diego presses his hands to Five’s wound again, continuing to try and staunch the blood flow, and Klaus chooses not to point out how badly he’s shaking.

“We don’t have a choice,” Luther replies. Klaus sighs.

“All right, just- be careful,” he mumbles, casting a nervous look at Five. Five, for all intents and purposes, looks quite peaceful besides the gaping wound in his torso. Klaus wonders if he’s dreaming about anything. 

“We do have more of the Bordeaux, if that’s what you were asking about,” Delores says, nodding to the corner of the little shelter they live in where they keep the wine. She’s avoiding the question again, which is rare for her. Delores is usually so honest with Five.

“What injury are you referring to?” He presses. “The last time I was hurt was during that cave-in, down off Washington, and my stomach wasn’t injured then.”

“No, it was your leg. I know,” Delores says. “I remember.”

“Then what…” Five trails off, turning to look up at the sky. He sniffs the air for a second and frowns.

“What is it?”

“I can’t smell anything,” he says, looking back at Delores. “That’s not right.”

“It’s not? Hm,” she says. “What were you expecting to smell?”

He gives her a perplexed look. She’s behaving so oddly today.

“Something bad, at least,” he answers. “There’s always flesh rotting somewhere, or food going bad because it can’t survive after growing out here. This sun and dry heat burns up nearly everything.”

“Maybe you can’t smell anything because you’re not really here, Five,” Delores suggests. Five blinks at her.

“What?” He says. “Well if I’m not here, then how am I-“ He gestures around them, searching for a better word but unable to come up with it. That’s fine. Delores won’t judge him. “Here?”

“That’s the first good question you’ve asked.”

“Delores,” he says, giving her a desperate look. Frustration isn’t working, so maybe pleading will. “Just tell me what’s going on. Please.”

“You already know,” Delores says. “You just don’t want to admit it to yourself.”

“Fine,” Five says, turning away. He can figure this out without her help, even if he would appreciate it. “I’ll get it eventually.”

“We need to find a bandage for him first,” Luther says, ever the leader. “He’s not going to make it if we just leave him bleeding out like that.”

“I’m not leaving him,” Diego says. “You guys probably don’t know how to, uh, stop the bleeding anyway,” he adds on, almost as if to cover up the sentiment in what he already said.

“Fine. Klaus, go find a bandage. Ask Chet or something,” Luther says. Klaus nods and rushes off.

Diego presses tightly on Five’s wound as Luther steps over to them. Five and Viktor always both look tiny compared to him, but it’s even worse with Five slumped on the couch. His hair is messy, falling in front of his face, and his breathing is both irregular and much shallower than usual. Luther just finds it lucky that he’s breathing at all.

“I don’t think I’ll ever get used to seeing him like this,” Diego says. His voice is quiet, strained in a way it usually isn’t. “You’d think after the first time it wouldn’t be so bad. But no.” He smiles grimly. “Then again, I guess I was a little more pissed at him the first time.”

“Why?” Luther asks. Diego sighs a little.

“Because he hid it from us all day, until he literally collapsed on the floor,” he says. “This time he didn’t. Although maybe he would’ve if there was a way to hide something like this,” he says, nodding to the wound- or really, to his own blood soaked hands covering it.

“Yeah, even for Five, that would be difficult,” Luther says. Diego chuckles slightly, although the stress doesn’t leave his face.

It isn’t long before Klaus returns with a rather long ACE bandage, which he’s already unraveling when he walks into the room. They figure something out where Klaus sits behind Five and props him up while Luther wraps the bandage around his torso, even though Diego seems offended at having to move. His hands have too much blood on them (and the real reason: are still trembling too much) for him to be very helpful at wrapping anything. 

Luther gets the bandaging done with a significant level of discomfort. He knows it has to be tight; otherwise there’s no point, but he hates the idea that he might be hurting Five further. Five doesn’t react hardly at all, however; in fact, he stays completely limp and quiet throughout the entire process. This almost disturbs Luther more. Five is never quiet. Especially during the few weeks Luther spent the most time with him in seventeen years, Five had been nothing but a tightly wound ball of manic energy, threatening to unravel at any moment (and doing so a few times), telling off all of his siblings for not caring about the apocalypse as much as he did only to bring word of a new one the next time they saw him. He seemed to run off coffee and pure adrenaline, only crashing when nothing else was physically possible at that point. Although Luther had always been the strongest of the family, Five quickly became the most invincible in his mind. Insults, fights, or downright death in front of his eyes never seemed to affect him very much. Luther was never sure if he admired or feared that.

Five doesn’t seem so invincible now.

Luther ties off the bandage when he’s finished, looking up at Klaus, who has occupied himself with petting Five’s hair like he’s a kitten. Luther wonders if Klaus is trying to soothe him through the bandaging ordeal, or just messing with his hair while Five is passed out and he still can.

“Let’s get him to the car,” he says instead of asking, standing up. Diego moves to pick Five up again, clearly tired of not helping. He’s cautious, though, and Luther has to give him credit for that. He watches as his brother wraps his arms underneath Five, scooping him up and standing slowly with him. Five’s head lolls against Diego’s arm, and Luther finds himself hating the sight of it.

He clears his throat, shoving his terror down as best he can and leading the way out. Diego follows him, Klaus taking up the rear this time. They get to the elevators and Luther presses the down button, taking a deep breath. He’s not sure if he’s ever going to see elevators the same again, although he imagines that feeling is worse for Diego.

“Maybe we should take the stairs,” Diego says behind him, practically confirming Luther’s suspicions. 

“It’ll be fine, Diego. This is faster once it comes up,” Luther says. He looks back in time to see Diego give a begrudging nod, Klaus looking apprehensive with his arms folded next to him. 

The elevator opens with a ding after a moment, and Luther holds it for Diego to get in first. He and Klaus follow once Diego is inside, careful not to bump into Five, and the doors close behind them before the car drops.

“Isn’t this familiar,” Klaus mutters. Luther gives him a stern look. “What?”

“Is that really necessary, Klaus?”

“Maybe not,” he mumbles, sounding a little apologetic. Luther sighs.

The trip from the elevator to the car is silent and tense. Klaus decides he’s driving without consulting either of them, leaving Luther and Diego to decide how to handle Five as he gets into the car and starts the engine.

“He needs to be buckled in,” Luther tells his brother. “It’s more dangerous to hold him the entire ride.”

“Fine. Which seat?” Diego asks. Luther looks at the car.

“Passenger? It’s probably easiest to get him out that way.”

“Fine,” Diego mumbles. Luther opens the door for him, and Diego sets Five down carefully on the seat. He buckles him in as his brother’s chin drops to his chest, and Luther doesn’t say anything when Diego pats Five’s head before he gets into the back seat behind him. Luther follows on the driver’s side, closing the door hastily behind him as he sits down.

“Drive, Klaus.”

“Is everyone buckled?” Klaus asks, looking in the mirror.

“It doesn’t matter, Five is. Drive,” he repeats. Klaus sighs and pulls away from the curb, heading off through the city as Luther and Diego put their seat belts on.

“Do you know where the nearest hospital is?” Luther asks once buckled, looking at Five. Klaus is driving carefully enough that he hasn’t been jostled around much yet.

“Oh yeah. Been there several times myself,” Klaus says. Luther decides he doesn’t want to know why- and has a good enough guess anyway.

“Just be fast. But don’t hurt him,” he says, gesturing to Five. He’s mostly just praying that the bandage job holds up until they can get him into the care of actual doctors. But for now- all they can do is hope he makes it through the car ride.

Five paces back and forth in the wasteland he calls home, arms folded tightly over his chest. This new body gives him a lot more flexibility, but he isn’t using much of it. He turns back to Delores as an idea comes to him.

“Does my being younger have anything to do with what you’re talking about?” He asks. Delores smiles at him.

“It’s not far off.”

“All right,” he mumbles, nodding a little and looking around. At some point, surely Delores will get tired of his cluelessness and tell him what’s happening. Her fuse isn’t as short as his, but he can be rather infuriating at times. He looks back after a moment.

“Is this all in my head?” He asks. Another possibility strikes him before Delores can answer. “Shit, am I dead?”

“Not yet, somehow,” she says. “You’re getting there, though, at the moment.”

“What?”

“Your brothers are trying to save you,” she says. “But it’s not like you’re making it easy, what with your being unconscious and all.”

He frowns at her. His siblings are a topic Delores knows not to bring up. His headache seems to be worsening.

“My brothers are dead,” he says, trying to keep his voice steady. He’s not sure he succeeds. Delores gives him a look that has far too much sympathy for his liking.

“No, Five,” she says. “They aren’t.”

“They are,” he argues. “I found them, I- buried them myself-“

“I know you did. And then, years later, you were hired by an agency called the Commission,” she says. “They took you out of this place, and you went back and saved your family. They’re alive.”

Five looks around, staring up at the sky. Now that he thinks about it, the sun does look far too bright to be real. He can’t seem to taste anything either. But even if he’s dreaming this up…

“Then why am I back here?” He asks, turning back to Delores. “If I managed to get out of this hellscape, why- why would my own brain put me back again?”

“Well, I don’t know,” she says. “Maybe because you were here for so long. Or maybe because you’ve been thinking about the apocalypse enough the past day as it is.”

Five puts a hand to his head, wincing slightly at the ache coming from his skull. As much as it hurts, he’s starting to remember what Delores is talking about. 

“I haven’t been thinking about the apocalypse that much,” he says. Delores levels him with a look.

“Five,” she says. “You zoned out for a good twenty minutes in the shower. You hallucinated Klaus being dead again. And then, you shoved everyone away like you do, nearly spaced out on the roof, and disassociated so much that Diego was concerned as soon as you saw a cockroach.”

“Diego,” Five repeats quietly to himself as the past 24 hours start flooding back to him. Diego. Right. The brother who put his hand on his shoulder after Allison strangled him- and the one who found him in the elevator. 

He needs to get back.

“Well- enough thinking about the apocalypse,” he says, straightening up a little bit. “I can’t stay here.”

“I agree. Unfortunately, denial is not going to help you help anyone once you wake up,” Delores says.

“What’s that supposed to mean? I’m fine.”

“Cinque,” Delores says gently, and Five looks away. It is not the time for sweet sounding romance languages. “You aren’t. Allison is your sister, and what she did hurt you- in more ways than one. It’s not going to be easy to just stop thinking about, well-“ She gestures around them. “All of this.”

“Why not?” He retorts. “I don’t see what Allison choking me has to do with this part of my life.”

“You just said it. You know what the connection is as much as I do,” Delores says. “You just hate to admit it to yourself.”

“Because I’m fine.”

“When Allison strangled you,” Delores starts. Five coughs a little as his throat seems to tighten almost psychosomatically. “It took you right back here, to when you first arrived- when you were coughing up ash and dirt every five minutes because these conditions weren’t remotely accommodating to anything human.”

Five folds his arms. 

“Maybe.”

“And to top that off, she told you you belonged here,” Delores continues. “The guilt you’ve been feeling, while misplaced, didn’t come from nowhere.”

“It’s not her fault,” Five mumbles. “She’s angry, and she lashed out. That’s all.”

“Perhaps so. But none of this is your fault either,” she replies. “Despite all your blaming yourself, there’s no logical way you would’ve been able to figure out that someone was going to kill all your mothers the day you were supposed to be born.”

“Why am I still here?” He asks, trying to ignore her. “Or rather, why are you telling me all of this?”

“Because you need someone to,” she says. “In case you hadn’t noticed, this method of ignoring how you feel and chasing distractions down in the form of alcohol or weapon-wielding guardsmen isn’t working out too well.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he insists. “I was only trying to figure out what was beyond that panel.”

“Immediately after one of your walls coming down in front of Luther, Klaus, and Diego,” Delores says. “Right.”

“Nothing came down,” he snaps, pacing away and immediately feeling guilty about it. Delores’s voice continues behind him.

“That insistence is exactly the sort of denial I’m talking about.”

Five sits down again, on the ground, since apparently he’s not really getting his clothes dirty anyway. He runs his hand through the soot in front of him, picking some up and letting it slip through his fingers. He watches it spill back to the ground before he looks at Delores.

“How am I supposed to wake up?” He asks. “If I’m dealing with the injury I think I am, it’s going to take more than Diego freaking out to fix it. I’m not sure I can wake up.”

“You can,” she says. “Let Diego, Klaus, and Luther worry about the physical part of it. You need to get past the mental block that’s keeping you here.” She gazes at him a moment before adding on the last part. “Repression doesn’t work, Five.”

“It just makes everything come back stronger. I know,” he mumbles, picking at the soot again. He's quiet a moment before voicing his latest complaint. “I don’t see what use I’ll be to them injured.”

“I don’t see what use you’ll be to them dead,” Delores replies. She was always so witty- the only one who could ever truly match him. Nobody ever seems to get that, even if she is a mannequin. 

“They need you, Five,” she continues. Has her voice always sounded this sweet to him? He remembers she’s not really here, at least not any more than he is, and a new pain starts in his chest.

“I miss you,” he whispers, closing his eyes a moment and lowering his head. He opens them and looks up to find Delores smiling sadly at him.

“I know,” she says softly. “And I also know that you will find me, given enough time, in whatever reality you’re in. But you can’t do that if you let yourself die here.” Five looks at her a moment.

"Do you promise," he says. "That if I go back- acknowledge that I've been reminiscing a bit too much, or whatever- you'll be there somewhere? I'll be able to find you?"

Delores gives him a soft smile. His chest aches again.

"Of course," she says. 

Five nods a little and takes a deep breath. As unnerving as it is, he sees her point about quitting with all the lying to himself before he returns. He stands up, brushes his (not real) clothes off, and braces himself.

They’re almost to the hospital when Five jerks awake.

It happens with a gasp like he’s just been pulled out of the deep end of a pool, which startles Klaus so much he screams and nearly swerves the car into the other lane. Five sits upright, looking around in a near panic.

“Woah, Jesus, Five- calm down, you’re alright, it’s fine,” Klaus says, practicing some deep breathing himself. Five glances towards the back seat and then slumps, resting his head back against the leather. Klaus can only see him look down towards his wound out of the corner of his eye, since he should really not be taking his eyes off the road with the collision he nearly just caused.

“Who did this bandage job?” Five asks, sounding far more out of it than Klaus would like.

“That would be me,” Luther says from the back seat. If Klaus didn’t know any better, he’d say his older brother sounds nervous. He’s not sure what about.

“Mm,” Five mumbles. The car quiets, waiting for the expert survivalist review he’s inevitably going to give. “…not bad.”

“Now I know he’s not doing alright,” Diego quips. Klaus lets out a chuckle that turns into nervous laughter very quickly, and the tension in the car seems to ease somehow. 

“Shush, all of you. Too loud,” Five says, setting his head back and closing his eyes. Klaus moves to snap his fingers in front of his face.

“Uh, Five, buddy? Think you could try to stay awake for us? At least until we get to the hospital?” Klaus asks. Five’s eyes open and he sits up again.

“You’re taking me to a hospital?” He asks incredulously. 

“It’s the only option,” Luther says, ignoring Klaus’s mumbled “That’s exactly what I said”. “None of us are doctors, Five.”

Five looks back at him for a moment, seeming to think before he sighs and relaxes again.

“Fine. You’re right,” he admits. Diego whistles lowly.

“He’s really not doing alright.”

“Shut up, Diego,” Five grumbles. It has nowhere near as much venom as it could. 

When they pull up to the hospital, Diego is the first one to unbuckle and jump out of the car before it’s completely stopped moving. He opens the passenger door, offering Five a hand. Five glares at him.

“I can walk. I wasn’t hit in the legs.”

“You weren’t doing a lot of walking when I found you,” Diego retorts. Five hisses and takes off his seat belt, carefully turning and getting out of the car. The wince he gives at his torso moving does not go unnoticed by his brother. 

“I think I should just carry you, man.”

“I’m fine,” Five insists, taking a step forward past him and placing a hand on his stomach. Diego considers a moment before he reaches down and scoops him up from behind.

“Ow- Diego!” Five squirms in his arms and then grimaces again, wrapping his arms around himself as if trying to soothe the pain.

“It’ll hurt less if you don’t struggle,” Diego says. Five gives him an icy look but goes still. “Good. Now hang on; I don’t feel like trying to carry you with your arms all limp again.”

“You’ve got to be joking.”

“I’ve seen you do it with Luther before. You look like a kid. No one is going to think it’s weird,” he says. Said Luther and Klaus, having gotten out of the car, watch the whole ordeal with amusement. Five mumbles angrily to himself for a moment before he reaches up and wraps his arms around Diego’s neck. The expression that makes it look like he’s about to murder someone does not leave his face.

“See? Not so hard,” Diego says, walking off with him. Luther and Klaus follow, Klaus jogging ahead a bit to hold the door for Diego so he doesn’t have to use his back to open it. 

They let Luther do the talking once they get inside, Diego and Klaus hanging back a bit as he tries to explain the situation to the receptionist working the front desk. Five’s head drops onto Diego’s shoulder after a moment, making his brother look down at him.

“Oh- hey, Five? Remember what Klaus said? No falling asleep, alright?” He says, nudging him a bit with the shoulder he’s laying on. Five sighs slightly, looking much less murderous with his eyes closed.

“This is a lot harder than Delores said it was going to be,” he grumbles. Diego exchanges a look with Klaus over that.

“Well, uh, just try and keep your eyes open for a little bit,” Diego says, looking back down at Five. Five opens his eyes to give him a look that is… honestly best described as a pout, especially when it’s on his tiny face. He really is out of it.

Diego looks back up as Luther comes over to them, having finished with the receptionist. Five turns his head towards him.

“So, uh, they’re going to take him upstairs as soon as someone gets a bed down here,” he says. Diego nods, relaxing a little bit, and Klaus lets out a breath next to him. Five doesn’t look so relieved.

“Are they gonna do surgery?” He asks. Luther looks at him.

“I don’t know. She didn’t say,” he answers honestly. Five sighs.

“Great,” he mutters. Behind Luther, the doors to the rest of the hospital bang open and a few doctors wheel out a bed. One of them quickly approaches the four Hargreeves holding a clipboard.

“Are you the, um-” She squints at a name written on her paper. “Harbeeves?” Klaus, Diego, and Five all slowly turn towards Luther with varying degrees of disbelief written all over their faces. Luther looks caught off guard for a moment before he recovers and plasters on a friendly smile.

“Uh, yes. Yes, that’s definitely us,” he says with too much conviction. She nods.

“Great. We’re going to take-” Another squint. “-Five? Up to the third floor and examine him before we decide what the best course of action is. You can just set him on that bed over there,” she addresses Diego, jabbing her pen over her shoulder towards the rest of her team.

Diego heads over, lowering Five hesitantly onto the bed once he gets there. Five lets go of his neck and Diego straightens up, looking down at him for a moment. Five meets his gaze.

“Alright- listen, man,” Diego starts awkwardly. “I know this is weird, but everything’s going to be fine, okay? Just don't worry too much. It’ll, um- all be fine.”

“You should’ve been a motivational speaker, Diego,” Five says. Diego folds his arms, opening his mouth to defend himself, but Five speaks again before he can. “I’m messing with you. Thanks.”

Diego goes speechless for a moment, blinking dumbly at his brother. He doesn’t think he’s ever heard Five thank anyone for anything, at least not without sarcasm dripping off of every word.

“Aren’t you full of surprises today,” he says. Five gives him a little grin, which just proves Diego’s point.

“Maybe,” he says, and that’s the last thing Diego hears from him before the doctor with the clipboard rejoins them and they wheel Five away.

Diego watches them disappear through the medicine bay doors for a moment before he turns and heads back to Luther and Klaus, who have found chairs in the reception area already.

“Really, man? Harbeeves?” He asks as he sits down. Luther gives him a halfhearted glare.

“I panicked, okay?” He says. “It’s not like I could’ve said Hargreeves.”

“And yet you kept the ‘Five’,” Klaus comments, picking up a tabloid from a side table and opening it.

“Nothing else felt right.”

“Or you just couldn’t think of anything else in time,” Diego counters. 

“That too,” Luther says, resting his head back. 

Diego shakes his head, folding his hands in his lap as he stares at the bay doors, even though it’s been a minute at most since they took Five back there. He’s not sure if the white lights and doctors and needles that come with hospitals make him or his little older brother more uncomfortable.

Either way, there’s nothing left for any of them to do right now other than wait.