Chapter Text
“Dave?” Klaus mumbles as we wakes up, his head pounding and his body sore. He’s lying on the ground and when he looks around, seeing his siblings young selves surrounding him, he remembers Dave is dead and he’s 13 again.
“Klaus?” a familiar, if younger, voice exclaims, slamming into him and wrapping him in a fierce hug. “Ben!” he exclaims happily “You’re alive!”
“I’m alive!” the two laugh joyously.
“Ben…” Diego breathes, and their other siblings, minus Vanya, are staring at him in awe, even Five.
“Hey guys!” Ben smirks and waves and Klaus is so overjoyed Ben is alive that the dread at being 13 again is overshadowed.
Five is the first of them to get over his shock at Ben being alive, stating in an annoyed voice “Not to break up this touching moment, but Vanya could wake up at any moment, and we need a plan that doesn’t involve locking anyone away.” he shoots Luther a look, which causes the blonde to wilt.
“Isn’t the plan just to train Vanya’s powers so she doesn’t make the world go boom boom?” Klaus waves his hands around a little as he speaks and Five scoffs.
“Way to simplify things Klaus, how very expected that you wouldn’t understand how delicate our situation is.”
Klaus inwardly winces. Harsh. Ben shoots him a pitying look, which he shrugs off. He also sticks his tongue out at Five.
“Anyways,” Five looks over at Vanya, and Allison by default as he had crawled over to sit by her sister the moment she woke “We have a few major problems to deal with. We’re thirteen, so we have to stay here with Reginald,” Klaus feels a bit of dread pool into his heart, memories of the mausoleum worming their way into his head.
He reminds himself that the only alternative to this was the end of the world, and death. Plus he figures he’d do this all again willingly if it means getting Ben back.
“Vanya!” Allison exclaims, drawing everyone’s attention. Sure enough the brunette is waking up, looking around confused and panicked.
“I-Wha-?” she sits up stiffly.
Five walks over to her and kneels next to her “Vanya, it’s okay. The world ended,” her eyes widen and she seems to remember “Oh god, I’m so sorry!” she stares at her small hands and tears well in her eyes.
“I ended the world- I- oh god!” she’s hyperventilating, and almost all of the ,now, children gather around her, reassuring her that what happened wasn’t her fault. Klaus and Luther stand back awkwardly, Luther because even he recognizes that Vanya doesn’t want to see him, and Klaus because he has no idea how to comfort someone properly.
Ben is much better at this sort of thing and since he’s alive again, Klaus figures he’s not really needed.
Plus he’s a bit distracted by the two women standing next to his siblings, screaming for help in sync, with blood and tears dripping down their faces.
~~~
Once Vanya has calmed down, the 7 of the sneak inside the manor, making Klaus truly feel like the 13 year old boy he now is, except the last time he was 13 and doing this he was alone and high.
They all gather in Fives room and the boys face twists into one of concentration. “Vanya we need to slowly get you off your pills, and train you.” he states and everyone nods. “We also need Reginald to not notice that you’re being trained.” to which everyone nods again.
“Okay, so does anyone have any ideas on how we do any of those things?”
Diego blinks “Usually you’re the one with all the brilliant ideas!”
Five shrugs “Well maybe I’m a bit tired from transporting 7 people years into the past.”
“I think-” Luther starts, startling everyone as he’s been silent since they got back, “that Five will be the best to train Vanya, but everyone except… uh no offence Klaus, but everyone but you should be able to help too.”
“Fair enough.” the seance shrugs, despite the wilting feeling in his gut.
“Luther’s right, sorry Klaus, but your power is not only essentially uncontrolled, but none of us can even see it.” Five agrees.
“Hey, I made Ben corporeal that one time!” he exclaims, despite knowing Five is right. He said fair enough really, no point in rubbing salt in the wound. Obnoxious old Klaus, no good and no help, always too high to learn to control his powers, not like it’s his powers that led to him always being high.
He may be useless still though, but reminds himself that he is no longer a junkie. No more drugs.
Even the small hope of seeing Dave again is enough to keep him far away from the drugs.
He shakes those thoughts from his head as Five shrugs, “Anyways, Vanya, are you okay with us helping you learn how to control your powers?”
Vanya nods shakily and Allison gives her a comforting smile.
“V-Vanya” Luther mumbles “I’m… well I’m really sorry about what happened. I never should have locked you up like I did.”
Vanya nods “I- Well I understand and I forgive you, and I want you to help with training, but I think I need time before you can truly be my brother again.”
Luther nods, giving her a shaky smile.
Klaus thinks she’s giving him more than he deserves, but it’s not his decision whether Vanya forgives Luther or not.
“What about dear old dad?” Diego asks skeptically, “He’s going to notice if we’re all going out all the time,”
Five hums in agreement “I think we need to figure out a way to distract him while we train Vanya.”
Klaus swallows and gives Ben a nervous look. “We’ll all take turns distracting him when we can then,” Diego decides and Luther raises a brow.
“Shouldn’t Klaus be the one distracting him, since we’re all going to be busy training Vanya?”
Klaus tenses up, but doesn’t let his fear show on his face.
“No way, we’ll all take our fair share of dad!” Diego exclaims, but Five intrudes on the conversation “No, Luther’s right this time” Diego and Ben open their mouths to argue but Five continues “We’ll all take turns when we can, but Klaus is going to have to take one for the team and keep dad away from us for the most part.”
Klaus wants to protest, but he knows that this is important.
“We should all share the burden-” Ben is protesting, but Klaus puts a hand on his shoulder “Nah it’s fine guys. I really don’t mind.” liar, liar, pants on fire a young girl chants from her seat on the ground, where she’s been watching with cold eyes.
Klaus doesn’t even look at her for more than a second, the gore of the bullet holes in her head making him feel sick.
“Klaus, you don’t have to-” Ben starts but Klaus interrupts “Benny boyyy, I can handle it. It’ll probably be good anyways. I can finally learn some proper responsibility and all that.”
He hears everyone but Vanya and Ben snort at that.
He tunes everyone out as they continue to discuss plans, dread pooling in his heart, as he realizes he’s going to be spending even more time in the mausoleum, or worse, this time around.