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Five Hargreeves knew that this life was not his first.
It was a piece of knowledge that he had always carried in his soul. He didn’t exactly remember his first life, just flashes of a mysterious past born in the haze of dreams.
He lived on the cusp of half-remembered memories, of a world that just brushed his fingertips every time he reached for it, though never enough for him to get a good grip.
He lived a life of almosts .
Almost close with his siblings, almost good enough for his father’s praise, almost ready to time travel.
He lived a life of almosts .
He lived a life of nevers .
But one day, he read a book about a Greek boy named Icarus and something clicked .
Memories came flooding back soon after that. By the time he was ten years old he remembered what it felt to be imprisoned, to glide through the air with the taste of freedom on his lips, to scream as his wings melted and he fell beneath the waves. He knew what it felt like to die, saltwater in his lungs and regret in his heart.
He kept this all to himself, of course. Reginald Hargreeves was a scientist before everything else, even his duties as a father. Five didn’t doubt he would be curious of the idea of rebirth, and want to study it. But he had no desire to be a lab rat.
So he hid, and he trained, and he did his best to not make the same mistakes as before.
Except he let his pride get the better of him again . He ran away from his father, Grace, his siblings , into the swirling winds of time, and got lost in an empty world that reeked of death and ash.
When will you learn your lesson? his mind screamed at him as he ran through flaming rubble. You’ve flown too close to the sun once again, and now your wings are melting .
Standing in the terrible and empty open of the Apocalypse, Five reflected on how he allowed himself to fall beneath the waves, and wondered if, this time, he would drown under the weight of his pride.