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Relaxing was something foreign to Five. He was a creature of motion, never slowing down. Not by choice; if he was being honest with himself, Five wanted nothing more but to curl up in his bed and promptly pass out. But as Newton’s first law states: an object in motion stays in motion until acted upon by an opposite force. And Five has yet to meet that force.
Sure, his siblings made comments here and there about how wired he seems. But after the two whole apocalypses they all had to stop, everyone was understandably more focused on their own health and mental state to focus on Five. Especially when he was the one they looked to to be the one standing strong, the one with the plan, the expert on all things apocalypse.
Once they landed back in the future and were met with the sight of a new academy with Reginald’s brand new toys that he was eager to show off, the siblings- now annoyingly dubbed Team Zero by Diego- promptly left the mansion and haven’t set foot back in it. To everyone’s surprise, faced with the sudden new threat, Five was the one to urge everyone to hightail it out of there. Can you blame him? Two weeks, two apocalypse. He was NOT about to handle seven new powered up enemies without getting at least a few days of time off. Hell, even the commission gave them a day or two of rest between missions. Cut him some slack.
So.
Here he was, sitting on the curb outside of their temporary home base; a small two bedroom apartment that all seven siblings were currently sharing.
Snow lightly fell from the black sky, reminiscent to the constant shower of ash that Five was so familiar with. He closed his eyes, taking a deep breath of fresh, clean air. Not that city air was particularly clean, but compared to the apocalypse, it was heavenly. The brisk, cold feeling of it entering his lungs managed to tug a small smile from him. He marveled at the fact his lungs no longer wheezed and rattled when he breathed deeply. In fact, his body bore no marks of the apocalypse. With a tight feeling in his throat, the unwelcome thought that there was no evidence of what he experienced, no proof besides the memories he was left with.
The thought scared him, his entire life left with no trace it had actually happened. A more paranoid man might have the fear that it never happened. A dark, worm of doubt wriggling through his mind and making his memories feel like fog, no longer able to grasp them and say with clear conviction they were once reality.
Five wasn’t paranoid, of course. His memory was as sharp as ever, and nothing could cause him to doubt it.
He was as grounded to reality as he always was; he could feel the cold concrete under him, the frigid wind hitting his face, the light weight of snow falling on his head, Klaus’s voice to his left-
“What?” Five asked, blinking in shock as he noticed Klaus sitting beside him.
Klaus, who was in mid sentence when he spoke, glanced at him and sighed in relief. A nervous giggle bubbled past his lips.
“You settled back on Earth? Maybe your code name should be Space Boy instead! I’m sure Luther wouldn’t mind switching, he seems to despise all things space now-“
“Why are you out here?” Five snapped, cutting his brother off before he could continue his nonsensical rant.
“Well! I was so rudely awoken by a nagging spirit howling in my ear, and I stepped out for a smoke. Then I saw my dear little brother sitting out on a curb in the snow at three in the morning! So here I am.”
Studying him, Five took in his trembling, hunched over form. It seemed more than his usual jitters of pent up energy, his face was etched with exhaustion, his smile just a bit too sharp. It was still a shock, seeing his kind, goofy brother as this manic, broken man. Whenever he pictured his siblings, their faces were always preserved as their thirteen year old selves. Though now, he found they were getting replaced with the adult counterparts. It hurt, just a bit. Part of him wanted to return to the time just where he left, and pick up with his siblings where he left off. But now, he was left with the broken, unfamiliar versions of them. The kids that grew up without him.
“Hello? Five?”
He shook his head, sighing. “Sorry.”
“Woah, what?! An apology? Five, is everything okay?” Klaus lifted his hands in shock, his voice light and playful. But as he waited for the rebuttal that never came, his smile slowly dripped off his face. brows furrowing, Klaus grabbed his arm. The contact felt like fire on his skin, even through his coat. But he didn’t pull away.
“Everything okay?” he repeated.
“I’m just thinking.” Forcing the words through his mouth was a difficult task, his tongue felt foreign and heavy, his mind and body seperated and refusing to cooperate. He focused on the burning touch on his arm, the feeling grounding him.
“A little too hard, it seems.” Klaus’s voice became softer, muted by the heavy snow falling around them. “Be careful Five, you don’t want to get lost in that head of yours.”
He was silent, not looking at his brother. The concern was like a needle, pricking the balloon of misery in his stomach. The words threatened to pour out, but he was afraid if he started, he wouldn’t be able to stop.
“Five? Talk to me, man. The apocalypse is over, you don’t have to do everything on your own anymore.”
Klaus shuffled closer, his body radiating warmth, a stark contrast to the freezing air. It reminded Five of all the times he pressed up against Dolores in the winter, holding her tightly as his tears froze in his eyes, wishing desperately she was one of his siblings, warm and alive.
And now, he was given that wish. Klaus sat beside him, staring at him steadily, eyes bright and searching, not clouded over with death. His throat tightened. There was no point depriving himself of the comfort he desperately wanted for years, decades.
Five turned to Klaus, opening his mouth, and letting the rotten thoughts finally flow free.
“Do you know what it’s like? Being haunted by one dumb mistake you made as a kid? If I hadn’t ran out that day, everything would have been different. So many years I spent imagining that day, replaying it. Diego carving the table, Ben reading, you rolling a joint. Vanya tried to stop me. But I was so arrogant, I time travelled anyways. I almost drove myself mad, for days I would just lie in the rubble and replay that day. I would change it and imagine what would have happened if I hadn't ran away. And when the day dreams ended, and I was faced with the consequences of my mistake- of the reality I lived in- it took everything in me not to end it right there.”
He glanced at the sky, his entire body feeling heavy. Everything around him felt distant, detached.
“And now it’s all over. The apocalypse is nothing but a nightmare of mine now. No evidence of what I went through remains.” Five’s head dropped. “But I know it did, because every time I look at any of you, I just remember the children I abandoned. You all are so different now, you all are hurt and aching and if I had stayed maybe your lives would have been different. I was supposed to be the one who protected you all. But I was the catalyst to our family’s destruction.”
With a shuddering breath, he felt his eyes burn with tears. “I didn’t even get to say goodbye. One moment, I was seeing you all, young and alive sitting at the dinner table. The next, I found your dead bodies, except you were all grown up, all grown up without me. And Vanya's book, how the family fell apart. I should have been there. I should have been there.”
It took Five a moment to register the arms around him. But when he did, he hugged Klaus back just as fiercely, fingers twisting and gripping the fabric of his jack desperately, his entire body shaking under the swell of emotions.
“Five, you can’t keep doing that to yourself. You were just a kid. Just like the rest of us. You couldn’t have known what would have happened.” Klaus’s grip tightened, his voice wobbly, yet firm, fierce with conviction. “None of us ever thought for a second you abandoned us, Five.”
Face pressed against Klaus’s shoulder, his fur lined coat tickling his nose, Five spoke in a shaky, broken voice.
“Do you forgive me?”
“Oh Five…” For a moment, Five was afraid Klaus would pull away, but all he did was wrap him up tighter in his arms, pulling him against his chest. “I don’t need to forgive you, little buddy. You did nothing wrong. You came back and saved us, you spent your entire life trying to get back to us. I should be thanking you- which, thank you, by the way. But just because I know your big smart dumb brain won’t let it go until I say it, I forgive you.”
In that moment, Five felt like he truly was thirteen again, bundled up in his younger-older brother’s comforting embrace. He could pretend for just a moment, he was a kid once more.
He hadn’t felt like that since the day he ran away.
Five choked back the emotions that threatened to overwhelm him, the relief crashing down onto him. Klaus forgives him, he doesn’t hate him for his mistake. His fear that even if he did make it back home, his siblings wouldn’t want anything to do with him, hating him for abandoning them, it was thankfully just that, a fear. Irrational and untrue.
“Thank you,” he breathed out.
And with that, Five finally had that long, long overdue breakdown he forced himself to postpone the second he got back to his family.
Just like in the apocalypse, he cried out in the cold air, wind billowing around him, the snow flakes nearly blinding him.
But this time, he felt the warm, alive body of his sibling holding onto him, rocking him and whispering reassurances.
And for the first time since he was thirteen, Five relaxed.