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As the world went to hell around her, she didn’t stop playing. She didn’t care about the screams when the rest of the audience tried to run away, when people crashed and climbed over each other in their frenzy, didn’t care about the gunmen in masks shooting up the place, or the way her siblings cowered behind the rows of seats, doing their best to retaliate. No, for her, there was only her violin and her music. It was her time to shine, after all those years of isolation, of being oppressed, and she had spent so long practicing for this concert that nothing was going to get in the way.
She sent out a pulse of energy whenever the bullets came too close, but even in the throes of a power high, she recognized that they weren’t actively shooting at her. The masked men were trying to stop her siblings (kill, a part of her mind whispered) and she ignored them and carried on playing, letting the music flow from her mind and into her fingertips, the thrum of power within her violin growing with each note she played.
Perhaps subconsciously, she believed that her family would prevail, that they would be able to overcome the overwhelming numbers of shooters because they were the Umbrella Academy, they were heroes, and heroes could do anything. Even while she played, she could see the number of bodies littering the ground, all of them belonging to the masked men, and none of it to her family. She didn’t realize what it meant to let them continue pelting bullets at her siblings until Klaus crashed into the theatre loudly, drawing all attention to himself.
Everything seemed to slow down.
Through the growing cadence of her music, she heard the other Hargreeves shout for Klaus to get down. The thin veil of power covering her eyes slowly diminishing as several gunmen turned to him. Her hand on the bow slowed, the tune dropping into a low, mournful croon as she watched, her fourth brother just a fraction of a second to slow to react.
The crack of the bullets were lost in the chaos. Standing up on stage, with her music slowly fading, Vanya had a front row view of the way her brother’s body jerked slightly, crimson spots slowly growing on his shirt.
Her eyes met his, and she saw the way the light seemed to fade out from them.
She heard a shuffle, and her fingers stopped moving. Vanya turned around, blinking at Klaus, who had somehow managed to get into her room and was now sitting on her bed.
“I just want to listen to your music. It’s nice.” He said quietly, far from the loud-mouthed child he normally was at any hour of the day.
She stared at him for several more moments, before carefully placing the violin on her shoulder, a moment’s hesitation before she lowered the bow onto the strings. She played a slow tune, feeling lighter than she’d ever been in the months since their father told her she was ordinary. She studiously ignored the haunted look in Klaus’ eyes, the tremor in his hands that he tried to hide beneath her blankets. She transitioned from one song to the next, watching from the corner of her eyes as the rigidity of his shoulders slowly eased, the tension bleeding out from his form until he was no longer curled defensively on her bed.
She smiled at him, a small, hesitant curl of her lips which grew wider as her brother returned it.
The smiles dropped when they heard the bell ring, breaking the tranquillity. Vanya’s smile dropped, knowing that they were going for yet another mission while she was to stay at home. To her surprise, Klaus had paused before he left her room, dropping a quiet ‘Thank you’ before he disappeared out the door.
The small gesture was enough to bring the smile back onto her face, and she went through the rest of the day with a light heart.
Brought back to the present, Vanya watched with tears burning behind her eyes as Klaus crumpled to the ground lifelessly. She’d forgotten – how could she have forgotten? Despite their fucked up childhood, despite the oppression she’d felt whenever they went off on missions without her, or the hurt she felt whenever their father reminded her how ordinary she was, there had been some good memories too.
Allison braiding her hair when they were five, Five coming to her room to talk to her despite his normal haughty demeanor when Father locked her in her room, Ben – quiet Ben who shared his books with her, Diego, who scowled and pitched a fit but who had given her the pancake Mom had made for him when he found her crying under the stairs. Even Luther, who had never been intentionally cruel even as he followed Dad’s orders to the letter.
And Klaus, who would sneak into her room occasionally in the early hours of the morning with a haggard look on his face (on the days when she realized that Ben wasn’t awake yet) and listen to her play until they were called down for breakfast.
Klaus, who had been ruthlessly gunned down – by the same people who were trying to protect her from her family, people who wanted her to unleash the end of the world.
A heartbeat. Two.
Vanya screamed, slashing her bow at the gunmen. She didn’t care that her powers cut through their bodies like a knife through hot butter, couldn’t be bothered about the way their blood splattered across the theatre like a gruesome painting, or the way their severed limbs dropped with a disgusting wet flop to the ground. She dropped the violin – the same one Sir Reginald had all but given to her – stumbling off the stage and dropping to her knees beside Klaus’ still form within seconds.
Tears clouded her eyes as she cried, pushing feebly at her brother’s body. She hunched over, sobs tearing themselves out from her throat as her body shook with the force of grief. She felt a sudden presence beside her, startling lightly when she felt warm arms encircle around her. The bolt of fear that lanced through her vanished when she recognized Allison’s voice, the other woman pulling her back slightly, holding her tight. The thought that Allison would betray her like Luther did crossed her mind, but it disappeared as soon as she felt her sister shaking and she realized that as much as Allison was trying to help her, she was also trying to keep herself from falling apart as well.
“I’m sorry.” Vanya choked, curling in on herself, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry –”
She could have stopped the shooting before it ever began, could have saved her family before anyone got hurt but she didn’t. She could have done something – anything, but she had been too focused on herself, too focused on lashing out at everyone and anyone, too focused on the power that rushed through her veins to care about anything else.
“Klaus!” Diego shouted, the gentle way in which he turned his fallen sibling over contradicting with the rage that decorated his face.
“Klaus – hey, hey you don’t get to f-fall asleep you lazy asshole –” he stuttered, squeezing his eyes shut as he pressed a hand against one of the still bleeding wounds on his brother’s chest. A futile gesture, considering the lack of a heartbeat.
Shot in the back, his mind supplied coldly, just like Eudora.
“Fuck!” Diego snarled, curling over his brother’s head, which he’d dragged onto his lap.
Beside him, Luther hovered, unsure of what to do, unsure of what went wrong.
Five scowled down at the stained carpet, his hands curled into fists at his side.
Unseen by all of them, Ben knelt beside Klaus, staring at his hands.
“Don’t give up.” He pleaded with them, though his words went unheard. “Don’t give up on him please. He’s not dead! I’m still here!”
Ben reached out to his brother, snarling in frustration as his hand went through like every other time it did. I’m still here, he thought, If I’m still here it means that he isn’t gone. He’s not dead.
He’d seen Klaus die many times over the years, the most recent being in the rave where he tried to save Luther. (Luther who had left without a backward glance, who hadn’t even noticed that Klaus had died protecting him –) But he’d always come back. Klaus had always come back to him.
If he hadn’t been so close, Ben would have missed the twitch in his brother’s fingers. He grinned broadly as Klaus suddenly shot upright, missing Diego’s face by scant millimeters when Number Two’s reflexes sent him flinching backwards instinctively.
Klaus shouted, his eyes wide and unseeing as he pressed a hand to his chest, breathing heavily. He focused on Ben, who was giving him the widest grin – and were those tears he saw? – he had ever seen on his face.
“She kicked me out! Can you believe that?” the flamboyant Hargreeves complained, trying to calm his racing heart, “She said that she didn’t want to see my face and kicked me out. Me! Have you seen this face?”
Ben laughed, somewhat hysterically, launching himself at Klaus. He didn’t know who was more surprised, him or the newly resurrected Klaus when he connected firmly with his brother.
“Ben?” Allison whispered, staring with disbelief.
Ben looked down, noticing the blue glow that seemed to outline his form, a blue glow that emanated from Klaus’ palms.
“You –”
Ben threw his arms around his brother, burying his face into his neck. “You’re an idiot, a colossal idiot! I told you not to run into the theatre!”
“But –”
Ben released Klaus when he heard Vanya sniffle, getting out of the way just in time for their last sibling to throw herself at Klaus, knocking him back slightly until Diego caught him, his hand squeezing his shoulder somewhat painfully.
“What –” Klaus blinked, looking down at the sister they had been trying to stop as she did her best impression of an octopus. “What happened?”
His siblings all looked at each other, caught somewhere between grief and relief.
It was Five who answered him, pasting a bored look on his face. “You got shot, like an idiot, because you decided that running into a room full of gunfire was a smart thing to do.”
Klaus cocked his head to one side, looking at his brother intently before grinning, “You cried when I died didn’t you?”
Sputtering in shock, Five leveled him with a defensive sneer, “I did not you moron.”
“How are you not dead?” Luther interrupted, wincing when the question left his mouth. “I didn’t – I mean – I’m glad you’re not, I just –”
He felt his chest tighten, the way it did every time Luther opened his mouth and out came something that was a poor imitation of their father. He’d gotten used to it though, so Klaus did what he always did, he played it off as a joke, shrugging carelessly, “I died, met God – which by the way, isn’t as friendly as religion portrays – she decided she didn’t like me and kicked me back to life.”
The disapproving furrow that Luther always seemed to get every time they spoke made its way onto his forehead, and Klaus hunched slightly, ready for whatever Number One was about to throw at him.
Before he could say anything though, he heard Vanya speak up – so quiet he nearly missed it, “I’m glad she kicked you out, I'm glad you didn't stay there.”
Behind him, Diego swallowed, refusing to acknowledge the horror and fear that gripped him when Klaus had come bursting through the doors and the men turned their guns on him.
“I’m g-glad that y-you’re not dead too.” He forced out, trying to get his tone level, “Though I think you’re the first to be kicked out of heaven on the basis that God didn’t like your face.”
Klaus would have responded to that, but Allison drew his attention next, her relieved smile telling him all he needed to know.
In the middle of a theatre torn apart by bullets and supernatural powers, the Hargreeves siblings huddled together in a way that they’d never done before, seeking comfort in each other’s presence.
“If I’d known that killing you would stop the apocalypse I would have done so earlier.” Five grumbled, breaking the silence.
Feeling Vanya tense slightly, Klaus hugged her tighter and gave his brother a sweet smile, “Fuck off asshole.”