Chapter Text
About a week after averting the apocalypse, they all went out for dinner as a family – Klaus’ idea, of course. Something that felt very foreign to Five after decades alone and starving in the apocalypse.
Five hadn’t been able to use his powers since they got back to the future, and unlike everyone else, who had all returned to their adult bodies, he remained in his 13-year-old body. He put the first issue down to him being exhausted from jumping through time with six other people. And the second, he blamed on life just loving to screw him over.
Surprisingly enough, they managed to avoid any arguments, and even Luther and Diego were being civil for once. They just enjoyed their food and shared details of their lives as if they hadn’t almost died in a fiery explosion. It was all quite pleasant, actually. Five even smiled a couple of times.
Everything seemed perfect, which of course made Five uncomfortable. About half an hour into their meal, he excused himself, saying he needed some fresh air. He walked until he was out of view and leaned against a cold brick wall, inhaling the damp air and closing his eyes for a second. It was almost peaceful, which might make other people feel content and safe, but for Five, it only served to put him more on edge. He knew from experience that nothing and no one was ever truly safe.
He heard footsteps, and when he opened his eyes, he noticed a rather large-looking man walking towards him. Although, that being said, everyone seemed bigger than he was right now (excluding Vanya, of course, who actually seemed like she had shrunk since the day he disappeared). He told himself he was being too paranoid. The man was probably just heading for the diner, so he remained in his spot.
He’d been told many times by his siblings that he needed to relax and not be so hostile towards other people. "Not everyone is a threat," Vanya said a couple of days ago when Five almost stabbed the mailman with a butter knife. Five may or may not have responded with a cruel retort about Harold Jenkins. He felt terrible about it immediately, but his pride wouldn’t let him apologise. She didn’t talk to him for the rest of the day, but Five still felt that she forgave him quicker than she should have.
Klaus seemed to think he wanted something – some reason – to fight. Five told him he was being stupid, something Five still thought was true, but maybe there was also some truth in what Klaus was saying, not that he’d ever tell him that.
He turned to look at his siblings through the diner window. They were all laughing and smiling. They looked genuinely happy, which was all Five ever wanted for his family, but he couldn’t help but feel apart from them, and not just because he left the diner. Things had been different since he came back. He knew a lot of things, but he didn't know how to function as part of a family.
God, he wished he looked old enough to order a drink like his siblings. He needed something strong to dull his thoughts.
The man walked up to the entrance, but instead of entering the diner, he suddenly turned to where Five was, and he looked at him with an expression on his face that made Five feel uncomfortable and uneasy. His instinct was to spatial jump away, but then he remembered he couldn’t, and then when the man started getting handsy, he tried to fight him off, but he was stuck in his scrawny 13-year-old body and he hadn’t properly slept in weeks, so he was exhausted. Every move he made to fight the guy off was useless, not that this stopped him from struggling.
In a last-ditch effort to get out of that situation, he opened his mouth to scream for help. The man was one step ahead of him, though, and covered his mouth. "Don’t say a word." He growled in Five’s ear.
Five bit his hand as hard as he could, tasting blood immediately. He heard him scream out in pain and then felt a sharp pain in the base of his skull as he was punched.
Dipping in and out of consciousness, Five was dragged by the creep into a nearby alleyway until they were away from prying eyes who might want to stop him.
By the time the man was done with him, Five was a mess. His face was bruised and grazed from when he was shoved to the ground and scraped against the gravel; he had hand marks on his hips and waist, not to mention bite marks on his neck. He was sore everywhere, and he barely remembered pulling his underwear and shorts back up, but apparently he did. He just sat there for what felt like hours, very aware of the pain, but for the first time since the Handler took him on, he didn’t know what to do.