Chapter Text
Over these many long years, Five learnt not to wish for time travel.
His first time jump brought him forty-five years of involuntary isolation in an apocalyptic wasteland With the exception of Delores, he surely would have lost his mind if not for her.
His second time jump, without the suitcase, dragged him into thirteen-years-old body and another apocalypse.
His third time jump was by far the worst. Holding his siblings’ hands, while the world was ending around him. It didn’t feel like a jump at all.
Usually going through the time stream felt like playing tug-a-rope while being sucked in a vacuum cleaner. Now it was like there were dozen more people on the end of that rope (or one regular Luther) and the vacuum cleaner was squeezing them through a keyhole.
If it wasn't for someone gripping his hand painfully tight, Five was sure he would have accidently dropped them all. It felt like years squeezed into seconds. And then the tug felt stronger again as they were sucked out of it. And that sweet release was the last thing five remembered before passing out.
...
Five never really specified where he would take them, but Allison assumed it would be only few days before the apocalypse, to give them another chance to prevent it. Nothing prepared her for waking up on the floor of the darkened, extremely familiar lobby. It took few seconds for her eyes to adjust to the surrounding darkness.
“Fuck, not again.” She heard a child’s voice swear beside her. She turned around only to jump on her feet and back away in shock. There sat Diego, but not as she remembered him in his awkward vigilante attire and countless knives, but in the body of a smaller teenage in his much-hated school uniform.
Allison felt her stomach twist into knots at the picture in front of her. All her siblings were there, in different stages of absolute confusion, in their fifteen year old bodies.
Luther was still holding an unconscious Vanya in his arms, gently lying her on the ground next to him. Diego turned to the unconscious form of Five, before trying to shake him awake. But after a few minutes deciding it was useless and giving Allison a concerned look.
“Is he alright?” Allison asked instinctively. She sucked in a loud, long breath as she realized she felt no pain in her throat and that she was capable of speaking again.
“Could be worse, considering what we just did.” Diego replied, turning his pale, unmoving brother into more comfortable position on the floor.
“At least we are all together.” Allison added in attempt to comfort them.
“No, no, no, no, no, no…” murmuring voice spoke out “We are not!” Klaus wailed, beginning to pace in small circles, while rather aggressively tugging at his hair “BEN is not here!”
“Why should Ben even-“ Diego began.
“Don’t you get it? Ben should be here! He was right here, he was holding onto me and now he’s GONE.” Klaus yelled, his voice getting more and more raspy, tears starting to flow down his cheeks.
Allison walked towards him, her hand outstretched, ready to to calm him.
“Klaus I’m-“
Her brother backed away from her, his head shaking violently like the rest of his body.
“Don’t you try your fucking voodoo on me right now, Allison!”
“I’m not-“ She began to defend herself, when a new voice interrupted her.
“What are you doing here, guys?”
A Small, fifteen-year-old Ben was standing there, staring at his siblings with an unconcealed shock. Before Allison could register what was happening, Klaus stormed at Ben to jump on his brother. Ben just stood there, drawing awkward circles on his brothers back while Klaus audibly cried into his hair.
“How did you get here, Ben?” Allison asked, with a hint of suspicion in her voice.
“I asked you first.”
“We literally just appeared here.” Diego supplied.
“Yeah, but from where? I was with you guys like few hours ago. If you wanted to leave someone out of your stuff, I thought it would be Vanya.”
Only then Ben seemed to notice the unmoving bodies of his siblings over Klaus’s shoulder.
“Why the hell are Vanya and Five on the ground?”
“We were... out!” Allison squeaked before Ben had a chance to question it further.
“On a walk!” Luther added with a similarly panicked voice.
“And we… got drunk!” Diego quickly finished, gesticulating in the general direction of their unconscious siblings.
So much for being the reasonable adults, Allison thought bitterly.
Klaus finally tore away from Ben, looking utterly bewildered.
However, none of them had a time to explain anything further. They all froze in shock at hearing disembodied yet familiar, stern voice of Sir Reginald Hargreeves.
“Number Six, what is this horrible racket at this time of the night?”
Ben immediately set into action quietly commanding them all to hide before Dad could see them.
In silent agreement, Luther and Diego held up Vanya and Five, running into the nearest room, the lounge. Allison had to peel Klaus off of Ben, dragging him away. She ducked around the corner, just in time to see Dad’s feet slowly descending down the stairs. Allison felt Klaus shaking against her slightly, as they clung to each other, back against the tall bookshelves.
On the other side of the huge doorway the rest of their siblings could be seen, looking as disheveled as Allison felt. They shouldn’t have go through any of this again; they shouldn’t have suffer their Father again.
“I thought I heard something.” Ben said. Technically it wasn’t even a lie. “I went to check it out.”
There was a small pause that gave Allison enough time to start fearing what would happen if Dad caught them there.
“Get back in your room Number Six. We will discuss this in the morning.”
And then his slowly quietening, echoing footsteps could be heard going back up the stairs. Allison exhaled a deep, relieved sigh.
….
Klaus's room was just as he remembered it. Too many vibrant posters covering the walls, messy shelves filled with gramophone records, books he never read and food wraps that he shouldn’t have. Mom always offered to clean it for him, but with how many secret stashes filled he had, filled with all sorts of things her or Dad wouldn't approve off, Klaus didn't want to risk her poking around.
Currently, the small room was overfilled with five of his siblings, all but Ben. They were sitting and standing around in various stages of confusion. With Vanya and Five still yet to wake up.
The room was silent except for the sound of Klaus’ foot hitting the floor, his leg anxiously bouncing. It took everything in him not to get up and roll up out of any of his many, many stashes. Like an empty Green day record, Vanya's book with a hole inside a cover, from under a bag, or just that tiny bit of weed he remembered taping under the fucking chair he was just sitting on. It was so, so tempting and would be almost too easy. He needed a joint so bad. Ben was here and Ben was alive, but he was the fifteen-year-old Ben not his Ben from the future, who was definitely completely dead. Klaus didn't know if he should be relieved or not. A nice, fat blunt would solve this. Make him forget about all this crap.
However, he couldn’t. Not because his siblings would judge him, who cared what they thought, but because he could see Dave, an outline of Dave, in the darkest corner of the room, slowly becoming clearer and beginning to look like Klaus’s lost love. Klaus really couldn't lose another person that day.
“What are we going to do?” Allison asked, not really looking at anybody in particular.
“We should get back. Stop the apocalypse.” Luther answered brazenly, have once again regained his leader persona.
“And how would we do that?” Diego questioned, annoyed “It's not like we have our ticket back on us right now.”
“We should kill Dad.” Klaus blurted, still watching Dave, his features becoming more and more defined.
“We are not killing Dad. We just got him back.” Luther stated sternly, as if having Dad back was a good thing.
Klaus could hear Diego snort loudly.
“Well, actually, I gotta agree with Klaus on this. It worked just fine last time and if the old fucker wanted to die so bad then, I vote we give him a second chance. Just sooner this time.”
“Plus our lives would be a lot easier.” Klaus mumbles.
“We are not killing anyone!” Luther commanded “Allison you agree right!”
At the silence that followed, Klaus tore his eyes away from what would soon become his dead boyfriend.
“You can't be serious!” Luther got up on his feet, visually infuriated, speaking a lot louder than he should have. “Do you all want to become murderers like Five? We are supposed to be a good guys, we don't kill people, let alone our parents.”
Klaus let out a low chuckle on that “Yeah, cause Dad was an A+ parent.”
“He was doing his best!” Luther defended.
“Well his best was a pile of shit.” Klaus said with a voice full of sardonic humor. He really hoped none of them heard how seriously he actually meant it.
“If it wasn't for a Dad, we wouldn't even be here!”
“If it wasn't for Dad, we wouldn't have an Apocalypse in a first place.” Allison jumped in.
At that all of her brothers tried to react at the same time. Five chose that exact moment to jerk up and instantly throw up on a floor.
The room fell silent.
…
“Would you all just shut up?” Five hissed, his words missing usual venom. Just sounding tired.
Unlike the rest of them, Five haven’t looked any different. He was still in his thirteen-year-old body, which managed to look even younger than before. His usually well-kept hair was sticking to his face; he was so deadly pale it reminded Klaus of many of his past ODs. But Five, being ever so his usual stubborn self, lifted himself up into a sitting position, brushing off Allison’s hand when she tried to help him.
“We can't kill Dad.” Five stated “We can’t risk changing the timeline. It could go well…”
“It will.” Diego interjected.
“…or we could all die. We can’t stop the apocalypse if we’re dead. So, keep a low profile and try not to fuck anything up.” Now that sounded like Five they knew and couldn’t stand.
“What about you?” Luther asked.
“I’m missing. Vanya has no powers. You guys are teenagers. Do something about that.” Five shrugged.
“So, we are just supposed to... be kids?” Diego asked, visibly disgusted.
“For few days at least. Until I run all the necessary calculations. But only if that’s not too much responsibility for you.” Five added, still tired, but with a heavy dose of sarcasm.
Luther either didn't catch the insincerity in his brother’s speech or he chose to ignore it “Sure we can do. Like reenacting a visit to our childhood.”
Diego scoffed loudly: “Cause that is exactly what we need right now. Another of many happy times with Dad.”
“What exactly are you getting at?”
“You sure as hell know what I’m getting at.”
“It’s late.” Allison said quickly, trying to de-escalate her brother's soon to be argument.
“I could catch some Zs” Klaus said with a mock yawn.
…
They decided that getting some sleep (even if it would be for a short while) was not such a bad idea.
Luther carried Vanya to her room, with Allison to look after her. This was, of course, a lie, on multiple levels. First when Allison said that she would use Rumor on her sister, though she had no intention in doing that and second when Allison convinced Five into staying with his two sisters, under the guise of needing his help watching Vanya when, in fact, she just wanted to make sure he wouldn't just ditch them for another of his solo-missions.
The fact that he fell for that was a evidence enough for her of how tired her brother actually was.
“She’ll be alright.” Allison said to herself and nobody, while watching her pale sister, so small and helpless. The “ordinary” girl in family of gifted individuals. But her plain, normal sister almost ended the world. And Allison refused to link those two Vanyas together. The Vanya she knew, the Vanya she was looking after wouldn't hurt a soul. She was the most kind and gentle person Allison knew. And Allison would do anything to protect her.
“She will.” Five mumbled from a giant armchair his small frame seemed to disappear into, eyes already almost closed “We’ll make sure of it.”
On that, Allison agreed.
….
By the time Klaus’s siblings left, Dave became fully corporeal, with his sandy blonde hair Klaus loved to play with, mouth Klaus loved to kiss, and the uniform Dave died in.
For once, the usually outspoken Klaus was silent. It wasn’t that he had nothing to say – he could go on for hours, beginning with ‘I’m sorry’ and ending with something like ‘You look especially gorgeous in blue. Is that because you fell from the sky?’. No, that was not a problem. Klaus was too scared to speak, feeling as if Dave would disappear the second he opened his mouth.
“Hi.” Dave said hesitantly after a long while. For the second time that day Klaus felt his face getting wet with tears, streaming down his cheeks.
“Hi.” Klaus replied with a weak, broken voice.
Another few moments of silence passed.
“You look great.” For a dead dude.
“You look young.”
At that they both chuckled little desperately.
“When you said you had a strange talent, I was not expecting that.” Dave noted, his voice still laced with a lethargic sadness.
“I can also wrap a joint using just my toes.”
At Dave’s unbelieving glance Klaus squealed “I can!”
Dave chuckled, but quickly followed by soft: “I missed you.”
“I missed you too. So much.”