Archive of Our Own

“Remind me again whose brilliant plan it was to follow the terrorists to their base?” Five spat, hunkered to the too-warm floor on his belly as bullets burst through the walls above his head.

“They have hostages, Five,” Diego yelled over the sound of gunfire, his back flush against an overturned desk. The smoke Five was trying to avoid, in addition to the bullets, cast a light haze over Diego’s body. “I know it’s hard for your heartless brain to wrap around, but they’re kids. I wasn’t going to leave them.”

Diego’s words might have stung if they hadn’t been true. “Fine, but if you’d let me handle it on my own, maybe the building wouldn’t be on fire.”

“Let you handle it?” Diego scoffed. “The leader nearly shot you.”

“Right, but he didn’t, and yet you insisted on charging in like a bull anyway.”

“How was I supposed to know Gregor had powers like us? It’s not like he was holding a sign that said, ‘Oh, by the way, I sometimes spontaneously combust into flames.’ And you know what? If I had that power, I’d make sure my house was fire-proof!”

“It was a poor design choice,” Five admitted.

The smoke hadn’t been too thick when they’d ducked into this room and shoved a wardrobe in front of the door, and now that Five’s face was inches from the carpet, he could spot a letter opener a few feet from him, most likely a casualty from Diego’s hasty flip of the large desk. He blinked forward, rose to a sitting position, and tossed the weapon lightly in the air to get a feel for the weight of it. “What’s the plan?” Diego asked.

Five rolled his eyes. “Stay out of my way.” He blinked out of the room and into the hallway the gunshots were coming from. The smoke was thicker out here - it nearly obscured the forms of the five guards, who were all facing the room he’d just vacated and spraying bullets wildly. The first one collapsed in a spray of blood, and the second one followed him shortly after. It wasn’t until the third body hit the floor that the others noticed something was wrong, and by then, it was far too late.

Five tucked the letter opener into his jacket pocket, then scrubbed his hands against his pants. Of course, all that did was spread the blood to even more of his clothing. He took a breath to shout that the coast was clear, but the lungful of smoke he inhaled ensured all that left his mouth were raw coughs.

Diego burst out of the room, one knife raised above his head threateningly.

Five squinted at him. “I didn’t give you the all-clear.”

“You know, I have powers, too,” Diego said. “And they’re kick-ass.”

Five ignored him and started down the crackling hallway. Diego caught his arm. “What are you doing?”

Five shook him off and spread his hands. “You may have failed to notice, Diego, but the building is literally burning to the ground. I’m getting out of here.”

“Not without those kids.”

And Diego had that stupid, stubborn look on his face that Five had grown to hate, but Five tried to reason with him anyway. “Diego, this place is about to collapse, and I’d like us to be far from it when it doe-”

“Then we’d better find them fast,” Diego said, shoving past Five in the opposite direction of the exit.

Five gnashed his teeth. He wasn’t going to leave without Diego, but Diego wasn’t about to change his mind. Five could forcibly blink the both of them out, and he might have, if he knew Diego wouldn’t rush right back into the burning building. Although, if Diego were incapacitated. . . . 

Five considered that thought perhaps a little too long before finally conceding to himself: the easiest option was to locate the kids and get them out.

Muttering curses under his breath, Five blinked up to the second floor. The guards Five took out had to have been the last ones remaining - surely the others were smart enough to have left by now, which meant Five and Diego shouldn’t run into any interruptions while searching. Except for the fire. And the fact that they were in a mansion with far too many rooms.

The smoke hadn’t had time to completely envelop the upstairs, and while it was still hot, the heat wasn’t as oppressive here as on the ground floor. Five could blink into every single room on this floor, hoping one of them would contain a group of children while wasting time he couldn’t afford to lose. Not his favorite plan, as that would also involve wasting energy, which he needed to save if he wanted to teleport everyone out of this inferno. Definitely not his favorite plan, but currently his only one, so he blinked into the first room. No kids. The next three rooms also contained no hostages, but as he was preparing to blink into the fourth room, a faint cry of, “Help!” stopped him short. He jogged down the hallway, eyes straining through the smoke and wave of heat. The cries grew louder, and he was able to distinguish several different voices the closer he got to the end of the hallway. Then he spotted a door that was padlocked from the outside.

Five blinked inside the room. And blinked again when a blue vase flew toward his face.

As the vase shattered against the wall behind him, Five glared in the direction it had come from. A young girl with dark hair and darker skin, who couldn’t have been older than twelve, stared angrily back at him. “Who are you?” she demanded, her eyes flicking toward the blood splattered on his hands and clothes.

Five allowed himself a moment to observe the room before answering her. A large, unused bed was shoved against the wall, matching end tables arranged on either side of it (one sans a sky-blue vase); the body of a possibly-still-alive-but-Five-did-not-care-enough-to-check adult man was crumpled face-down on the carpet; and a group of four kids were clustered behind the girl who’d thrown the vase, all presumably between the ages of four and six.

He gestured to the man on the floor, cocking his head toward the girl. “I assume you’re the one who did this?”

The girl’s mouth tightened. “What if I did?”

Five shrugged. “I’m impressed, is all - although, next time, be sure to grab his gun.”

The girl sneered. “Didn’t need one to beat him.”

Five fought the urge to roll his eyes. Kids - always so damn cocky (until they leapt into a land of fire and ash and desolation and everything that had once mattered no longer existed).

The girl, arms spread protectively in front of the rest of the children, scowled. “And you never answered my question - who are you?” Her eyes found the blood on his hands again. “Are you a good guy?”

“No,” Five said. “But my brother thinks he is, so I’m here to rescue you.” He glanced behind himself, eyeing the smoke spilling underneath the door. He turned back. “We don’t have -”

A blue vase sailed through the air. He ducked just in time for it to fly over his head and crash against the wall, joining its shattered twin. The girl’s scowl never wavered, even as her arms stretched out in front of the other children again. 

“Dammit, would you stop throwing things at me?” Five snapped.

One of the kids, a tiny girl with bright red hair and freckles, burst into tears at his tone. A tow-headed boy that looked to be the youngest scrunched his brow in concentration. “Dam-it,” he pronounced slowly.

“I don’t know who you are,” the oldest girl said, her eyes fierce.

Five looked at her and the way she held herself in front of the other children and realized too slowly: She’s terrified. But Five only knew how to instill fear, not take it away. The best he could do was attempt to appeal to the reasoning of children. “My name is Five, and I’m kind of like . . .” The words felt like acid on his tongue. “A superhero.” Diego would have absolutely cackled to hear him say that. The Handler, too, although maybe for a different reason. “This place isn’t going to last much longer. If you stay, you’ll die.”

“What’s ‘die’?” the tow-headed boy asked.

“Besides,” Five continued, “if I were with them -” he looked pointedly at the unconscious body on the ground - “I would have killed you by now. No loose ends.” Talking, more often than not, was a waste of time, and never more so than right now, when the building was turning to ash. But he recognized that look on the girl’s face (he’d seen it a few minutes ago, hadn’t he?), and he knew she wouldn’t let him take any one of them out until she was convinced.

Why couldn’t Diego have been the one to find this room? He was so much better with people and comfort than Five. To be fair, so was a rock, which Diego probably wasn’t too far above.

The girl didn’t say anything, but one of the kids, a chubby-cheeked girl with purple glasses, complained, “My feet are hot.” The fire was spreading even faster than Five had anticipated.

The girl’s face twisted. “Fine,” she said. “How are you going to get us out? They locked the door.”

“The same way I got in,” Five said. “With my powers.”

“The man that took us had powers, too,” the girl said. Her gaze never left Five’s face.

“Well, I’m not him,” Five snapped. Two immediate problems had to be navigated before he blinked anyone anywhere: first, where he was going to teleport these kids, and second, how many he could take at a time. He couldn’t blink them directly outside, as easy as that would be. Who knew how many of Gregor’s men were waiting just outside the building, perhaps for their now-deceased leader, or perhaps to get another shot at Diego and Five. And since he couldn’t blink them all at the same time, he’d have to come back for the rest, leaving his first group alone.

He studied the kids. Most of them were very small - in fact, all of them were except for the oldest girl. The last time he’d used his powers on a group of people, they’d ended up in the wrong time and place, but those had been grown adults. He could definitely teleport the four children at the same time, which meant he’d have to leave the oldest here for a bit, but she’d proven herself to be capable, so that shouldn’t be a problem. She could handle herself for the minute - tops - she would be on her own. Blinking four people, even small ones, would expend a lot of energy, but he should still have enough left over to come back and get the oldest girl.

And Five suddenly realized where he could blink them.

“What’s your name?” he first asked the oldest.

She narrowed her eyes, as though she was deciding whether to answer or not, and then a boy with tightly coiled, dark curls piped up, “Katie!” The oldest girl sighed, but she said nothing to refute the answer.

“Okay, Katie, then,” Five said. “My powers won’t let me get everyone out of here at the same time. Since you’re the oldest, I’m going to take the kids first, then I’ll come back for you.” He was going for reassuring, but based on the flat look he received, he fell far short of the mark.

He had not been asking, he had been telling, but after a second, Katie nodded curtly. “All right,” Five said, pointing at the children still huddled behind Katie. “You four first.”

The redheaded girl and the dark-skinned boy immediately started crying and clutching Katie’s shirt. Katie rolled her eyes. “Don’t you know anything? You can’t talk to kids like that.”

I was too busy staving off starvation and treating my own wounds to remember what kids were, let alone how to talk to them, Five didn’t say.

Katie turned and squatted in front of the children. “He’s gonna get you out of here, okay?” she said.

“But -” the girl with freckles blubbered - “why aren’t you coming?”

“I am,” Katie soothed. “I’ll be right behind you guys.”

Without waiting to see if that was enough to assuage their fears, Five stepped forward and grabbed two of the kids’ hands. “Hold hands with one another,” he barked.

Once they complied, some annoyingly slower than others, Five looked at Katie. “I’ll be right back,” he said. Then he blinked to the ground floor.

The change in temperature hit him like a tangible wave. Everything was amplified down here - the heat, the smog, the sound of cracking wood. Smoke billowed around him as burning ashes drifted from the ceiling like dim fireflies. It was almost enough to remind him of a day that never happened to a boy that should have never existed. It was almost enough for him to see four soot-stained bodies again. It was almost enough to send him to his knees and -

The girl with glasses screamed, breaking him from whatever his mind was edging toward, and the two kids that never stopped crying began crying harder. Right. He came down here for a reason. “Diego!”

Diego rounded a corner, one arm covering his mouth. “Five?” he hollered, his voice muffled through his sleeve.

“Take these kids and go,” Five said, shoving the group towards him.

Diego frowned. “Where are you going?”

“There’s still one left. I have to go back for her.” The sound of splintering wood punctuated his statement.

“Dam-it,” the tow-headed boy said.

Diego, as though affronted by the word, scowled at Five. “What the fuck, Five, you can’t cuss in front of kids. They pick up on things like that.”

“Fuck,” the boy said happily.

Diego looked crestfallen. “Shit.”

“I’ll meet you outside,” Five said, then blinked back up to the locked room, which was almost cool in comparison to downstairs.

Katie flinched at his appearance, but Five had no time for niceties. His energy was waning. “Let’s go.”

Katie’s eyes were wide, and for the first time since he’d seen her, some of the fear she must have been feeling was reflected in her face. Acting as protector of the other children had been a balloon that bolstered her courage, and now that balloon was punctured, deflating before his very eyes. “How do I know you didn’t just take them to a different room? Or back to the bad guy? I don’t even know you, and I let you take them!”

“Katie -” Five said, taking a step forward.

Katie backed away. “I mean, you look like you’re my age, but you don’t act my age, or even talk like you’re my age, and you’re covered in blood!” She clasped her hands over her face. “Why did I trust you?” she wailed.

“So, do we have an agreement?” the woman with the crisp clothes and coiffed curls in a devastated, desolate world said, a knowing smirk on her blood-red lips.

“Because you had no other choice,” Five said quietly.

Katie stared at him with round, wet eyes.

Then, with a splintered shriek, the floor gave way beneath her in a splash of embers.

Five blinked to the ground floor a split second later, but he could hardly make out anything through the smoke. “Katie!” Heat clung to him like a sticky coating that he felt he could hardly breathe through or even see past, but he was able to make out the sound of somebody coughing to his right. “Katie?” he called again. The planks from the ceiling weren’t a blazing inferno yet, but the edge of the haphazard pile had caught flame.

“Here.” Her voice sounded strained. Five edged around the debris, squinting through the smoke until he found her flat on her belly. He knelt beside her, quickly assessing the damage. A large rip stretched down the length of her jeans, revealing a shallow scrape on her calf, but the most immediate concern was the thick slab of wood trapping her arm. “Are you hurt?”

Her bottom lip quivered, but her voice barely wavered. “Not too bad.”

“Can you move your arm?”

Katie’s face scrunched up in pain. “Yeah, but it hurts to.”

That was probably the best-case scenario, given the circumstances. If she couldn’t move her arm - or worse, even feel it at all - that would indicate serious damage. In this case, they could hope for a broken bone. But he couldn’t blink her out. Five’s calculations for his blinks had to be precise. Every piece that entered his portal had to be accounted for, and there was no way he could account for anything of Katie’s under that wood. “I’m going to lift that beam, and when I do, you have to get out from under it,” he said to her.

Katie bit her ash-coated lip, but she nodded.

Five crouched underneath the slab of wood and braced his shoulder against it. He didn’t stop to wonder if his skinny thirteen year-old body could handle the weight or if he could hold it long enough for Katie to crawl away. He also didn’t stop to think about how oppressive the heat had been on that first day. It had been hot other days, too, but nothing came close to the day he lost everything, when he wandered past shattered, burning buildings and twisted, silent bodies. But he wasn’t thinking about that, because that was years ago, and this was a house fire, not the apocalypse. Five grit his teeth. “On three. One -”

The widening of Katie’s eyes was the only warning he got before something slammed into the side of his head. Katie screamed. He stumbled to the side, orange and black swirling in front of his eyes as the smoke and fire merged into a blurry mess, but he was able to stay on his feet by slapping his arm against the burning wall. Something wet dripped down his temple. He bit his tongue hard enough to taste blood in an attempt to clear his vision. Anyone with half a brain should have deserted the building already, which was why Five had allowed his caution to slip. The only obstacle left should have been the fire. He turned around, keeping one hand on the wall for support.

Gregor, the man who’d organized the kidnappings, the man who’d taken Diego’s knife to the chest, the man who’d quite literally burst into flames as he’d laid prone on the floor, grinned lopsidedly and tossed a plank of wood to the side. “I was hoping to find the one who stabbed me, but I suppose I can settle for killing his kid.”

Five was still blinking the blurriness from his eyes when he heard a distant voice holler, “Five?”

Five inwardly groaned. Gregor’s smile grew even more lopsided. “Looks like there’s still hope for me, huh?”

Five wasn’t about to give him the chance. He blinked directly behind the man, ignoring the way his head flared in pain as he used his powers, and slammed his foot into Gregor’s knee, which buckled the wrong way with a loud snap. The man dropped with a howl, bringing his head within Five’s reach. Five gripped both sides of Gregor’s face with his hands, had a split second to register Katie’s horrified gaze, offered a silent, insincere apology to whoever protected the innocence of children, and -

Orange tongues of fire erupted from Gregor’s head, immediately scalding the palms of Five’s hands. He instinctively drew them back with a hiss, and almost instantly, Gregor lurched to his feet and swung around. The same inferno encompassing his head was blazing around the knee Five had kicked. Did Gregor’s fire have healing properties for himself? Was that why he’d lit himself on fire after getting stabbed by Diego? Five blinked away, wiping an arm across the sweat running into his eyes. He had to get out of this smoke, and sooner rather than later. Katie couldn’t be faring much better than he was, but he first had to figure out how to kill a man on fire with his bare hands. 

“Slippery,” Gregor said before coughing. Power to light yourself on fire didn’t include prevention of smoke inhalation, apparently.

Something glinted in the smoke, reflecting the orange and red glow of the heated inferno they were trapped in. Gregor sidestepped, barely wobbling on his bad leg, and Diego’s knife sailed harmlessly past. “Fool me once,” Gregor hummed in a sing-song voice. 

Diego, a shadowy silhouette shrouded in smoke across the hallway, clenched his fists. “He should be dead!” he shouted at Five.

Five scowled. “You should be outside!”

“You took too long,” Diego said, sounding more like an obstinate child than the actual children Five had recently shepherded.

Gregor lit his hands on fire and cocked his head at Five. “I think I’ll kill you first, then your dad.”

“Like fuck you will,” Diego snarled, but the lack of an airborne dagger to back that statement led Five to believe his brother was out of weapons.

Five’s next breath caught in his throat, and he coughed his lungs raw, until he could taste blood alongside the smoke. Blood and smoke and tears were all Five remembered tasting that first day. The first day of the rest of his lonely life. 

“Five?” he heard Diego say. This wasn’t that day. He wasn’t back there. He wasn’t. 

He pressed a hand to his chest, willing his hacking fit to subside, which was when he felt the hard, thin object in his jacket. Five suddenly liked his odds in this fight a whole lot better. He could get close, but he wouldn’t be able to stay close. Which should be fine - he wouldn’t need more than a second, anyhow. 

Gregor moved faster than he should have been able to after Five’s kick and was on Five in an instant, one fiery fist reeled back. Five blinked behind him again, his skull pounding, but this time Gregor was quicker on the uptake, and he whirled around before Five could stab the letter opener into his neck. An annoyance, but one that could be easily rectified. 

Five prepared to blink again and breathed in a lungful of smoke and watched ash drift from a ceiling that wasn’t there but a lead sky that was and felt the scream build up in his throat and heard nothing, nothing, nothing at all in a world that had ceased existing without him. And then a ring of fire clasped tightly around his neck and dragged him to the ground. His head slammed into the floor, and he automatically opened his mouth to inhale anything, even air polluted by heat and smoke, but nothing entered his lungs. Gregor’s face loomed over his own, smiling wickedly as Five gasped fruitlessly, and the fingers squeezed tighter around his throat. 

“Get off of him!” Five heard Katie scream, and Diego was yelling something, too, but they were quiet beneath the throbbing of blood between his ears. He could feel his throat compress between Gregor’s flaming fingers. Black dots crowded his vision until the man’s face was a pale blur.

Not like this! something in him howled.

His hands scrabbled uselessly at the large hands pinning him to the ground. This body was too small, too weak. He had as much hope of forcibly removing the fingers around his neck as he did of winning an arm-wrestling match against Luther.

Something in his throat gave way beneath the unrelenting grip. He wasn’t being strangled - he was being crushed.

“Five!”

Not like this, he thought again as he used the last of his strength to lift his hands up. But this time he was reaching for something different, something only he could grasp. He clutched the blue threads of time, gathered them in his fists and hauled in the opposite direction as something in his brain screamed in agony. He pulled on them until the fingers unpeeled themselves from his neck, until his throat was no longer enclosed by a manacle of fire, until he could take deep, rattling breaths of precious oxygen. As Gregor slowly rose backwards off of his knees, Five stumbled to his feet, grabbing the letter opener he’d dropped to the floor at some point and rising alongside the man. Gregor was in the air, lunging backward from where Five had been, his hands outstretched. Five stepped to the side and allowed the threads of time to slip from his fingers, which they did so readily. Time didn’t like to be manipulated. The longer he held onto it, the less flexible it became.

Five doubted Gregor had time to even register Five was no longer standing in front of him before the letter opener was handle-deep in his throat. But, just to be sure this time, Five yanked the blade to the side, completely opening up Gregor’s artery. Blood spurted from the gaping wound, spraying onto Five’s face, then the man fell face-first to the floor.

Five stood over the body, panting heavily. His head hurt so bad he could hardly see past the pain, and he felt exhausted, but he might still have enough energy to blink Katie and Diego out. He would have to. He unsteadily turned back to the beam on Katie’s arm.

He paused for just a second when he saw Katie’s wide, horrified gaze fixed on him. And it shouldn’t have mattered, because Five was a killer, because Five was apathetic to anything that wasn’t the apocalypse, but he had to swallow something bitter down anyway.

Superheroes weren’t typically coated in fresh blood.

Five bent beneath the slab of wood again and slowly straightened his knees as the heat of the board seared his back. “Go,” he said through gritted teeth.

Katie hastily rose to her knees, wincing as she dragged her arm out from under the burning pile. Diego arrived at their sides just as Five allowed the board to crash onto the floor. Katie cradled her damaged arm with her other one, her soot-ringed eyes wide. The vigilante quickly assessed Katie’s visible damage, then turned to Five. “You all right?”

Five couldn’t even find the energy to flash a mocking sneer. “Just peachy.”

Diego rolled his eyes and jerked his head forward. “Come on, we’ve gotta get going.” He started moving down the hallway, away from Five and Katie.

“No, we don’t have time for that,” Five snapped. His headache now felt like it was encompassing his entire skull rather than just the side that was hit. “I’m going to blink us out.”

Diego turned back and looked at Five incredulously. “You’re kidding, right? A sneeze could knock you over right now.”

“I can do it,” Five said at the exact moment the ceiling above Diego collapsed.

Time should have slowed down at that moment. Adrenaline should have flooded Five’s veins, giving him that extra boost he needed to blink and save his brother.

Diego had been there, and now he wasn’t.

Time should have slowed, but it was Five who was slowed. He sprinted toward the smoking pile of wood and plaster as Diego’s name ripped a raw chunk from his throat, so why did it feel like it took an hour to yank away the first piece of burning rubble? Somebody was mumbling Diego’s name in a frantic litany, but the throbbing in Five’s head was worse than ever, so he couldn’t figure out where it was coming from. Then he flung away another fragment of the ceiling and had to stop his frenzied digging, just for a moment.

Diego was there, and he was staring at Five.

Diego was there, and he was staring at Five, and there was a piece of rebar sticking out of his chest.

Diego was there, and he was staring at Five, and he was dead.

Five sat and stared and breathed and wondered why his head felt so light. He wondered why there wasn’t more ash. He wondered why he’d bothered digging Diego out when he’d just finished burying him.

He wondered wondered wondered.

“Is he dead?” a little girl’s voice whispered behind him, and if Five were a superhero, he’d pick her up and blink her away from this destruction. If Five were a better person, he’d shield her from her first view of death, or offer her words of comfort, or do anything at all for her.

Five was just a number, though, so when Katie started to cry, he let her. He couldn’t cry. Not anymore. Not for a while. He’d used up all of his tears over forty years ago, so it was strange that his vision was blurry.

No.

Wait.

He was a time traveler. This was what he did. This was something he could fix.

Five reached for the blue threads of time and gripped them in shaking fists as his headache spiked to a nearly unbearable level of agony. He grit his teeth through the pain and pulled on the threads. They moved agonizingly slowly, even more resistant to his interference than they had been the last time. Time had never liked him, but it was particularly unhappy with him now. 

As though suspended in molasses, the rubble encompassing Diego began to slip upward. The threads of time, more like steel rods than threads at this point, scalded the palms of his hands, but he refused to let go and strained even harder. The debris was rising faster now. Five was particularly interested in the piece of rebar that drifted back toward the ceiling. His head pounded. He’d lost vision in his left eye several seconds ago. That probably wasn’t good.

But then Diego was on his feet, his eyes trained upward as the first of the wreckage plummeted toward him. Just a few more seconds back, and all of the pieces would be lodged back into the ceiling, giving Five enough time to get Diego to safety. Just a few more seconds back, and -

The threads wrenched themselves away from Five’s bloody fingers.

There wasn’t enough time.

Without time, without power, Five had nothing left.

Of course Klaus was the first and only one to come back to the academy that day, so of course he was the only one to read Diego’s hastily scribbled note tossed onto the kitchen table. 

2 + 5 at bad guy HQ. Meet us there.

What followed was a sloppy series of numbers and letters that, after several seconds of deciphering, Klaus determined was an address. The note was most probably definitely meant for either Allison or Luther - you know, people who could actually contribute to a fight - but neither of them were here. Klaus considered pretending to have never seen the message and going to bed, but after a brief aside with his new-found conscience he’d nicknamed Ghost of Ghost Ben, he reluctantly decided he should at least show up and offer moral support, if nothing else. Well, moral support plus some constructive critiques. Nothing was more rewarding than pissing Diego off when he thought he was doing hero work.

Klaus sighed. “Why does it always have to fall on me? I’m so tired of being the responsible sibling.”

Klaus waited for the snort of derision.

Then he remembered and had to laugh out loud to make himself feel better.

When Klaus arrived at the address, the secluded mansion was already a blazing inferno, a beacon visible from miles away in the darkness. He was obviously late to the party - a slew of emergency response vehicles were parked in front of the building.

Yikes, Klaus thought as he drew nearer. What’d they do this time?

Klaus had been headed for the mansion, but when he noticed a hunched figure silhouetted against the roaring flames seated on the grass a distance away from the fire trucks and ambulances, he angled toward the familiar form. Klaus plopped down next to them, leaning back on his hands. “So, whose fault was it?”

Five’s chin was resting on his forearms, which he’d crossed over the knees that he’d drawn up near his chest, making him look more like a kid than he ever had since he’d come back from the future. His eyes, intermittently creased in shadow in the flicker of the flames, were aimed at the activity outside of the house, but his gaze seemed distant. Ash and soot were smudged onto every visible piece of skin, and his clothing was tattered and burnt.

Klaus waved a hand in front of Five’s face, ignoring the dread that began tugging on his gut. “Hellooo?”

Five blinked. “Hm? What did you say?” He didn’t look away from the building.

The dread pulled harder. The question was completely missing Five’s trademark snark. “I asked whose fault this was.”

“Oh.” Five grimaced. “My own, I guess.”

Klaus glanced around the two of them. “Where’s Diego? Shouldn’t he be flaunting his crushing victory over the bad guys?” When Five turned his head toward Klaus, the first time he’d moved his gaze away from the mansion, Klaus saw the full extent of the state of Five’s face for the first time. “Dude, what happened to you?” Dark blood smeared the side of his head, and his left eye looked unfocused and bloodshot, the whole pupil ringed in crimson.

Five shrugged listlessly. “I’d always wondered what would happen if I managed to use my powers when I had no energy left.” His smirk was a shadow of the brash sneer Klaus was used to seeing. “Now I know, but it’s a little too late.”

Wrongness skittered across Klaus’s skin. “Five, where’s Diego?”

Five pointed toward the vehicles in front of the building, the flames casting a gleam on the fresh blood on his hands.

Klaus’s voice felt stuck in his throat. “Is he okay?”

For a long moment, Five said nothing, his gaze returning to the fire. Then, finally, he answered. “No.” 

Klaus’s heart clamped in his chest so suddenly that he couldn’t breathe for a few seconds. Then Five continued, and the pressure eased slightly. “At least, not for a while. But . . .” Five sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I think he will be, eventually. But he’s going to need your help.” Five looked Klaus directly in the eyes.

The dread, the wrongness, the sickening pressure began clambering up Klaus’s throat, but he didn’t know why. “What do you mean?” Klaus asked. 

Five winced and looked away almost awkwardly. “Ah. Um, I thought you already knew.”

“Already knew what?” Klaus said, but it was at that exact moment he caught sight of a firefighter stumbling out of the front door, something in his arms.

There was a ringing in Klaus’s head, loud and persistent. With a desperate lunge, Klaus swiped a hand at Five.

It passed through him, as Klaus knew it would, because the firefighter was cradling Five’s body.

The conglomeration in Klaus’s throat burst free with a sound that fell somewhere between a sob and a cackle. “You’re fucking kidding.”

Five scowled. “You see death all the time. I thought your reaction seemed appropriate enough.”

“You thought my reaction to my brother dying was to stroll up to him and start a regular-ass conversation?” Klaus was on his feet now, and his eyes were burning, but whether that was from the rage or the heat or the tears, he didn’t know.

Five had the sense to look at least mildly abashed. “I’ll admit I may have miscalculated.”

Klaus collapsed back onto the grass, his head in his hands. He needed a minute.

“Diego’s going to need your help. You know he’s always been the softest one of us, besides Luther. He -”

“Shut up,” Klaus snapped. “Give me a second to wrap my head around this, okay?”

Five shoved his hand through Klaus’s cheek. “Hey, moron, I don’t have much time.” Klaus yanked his eyes up to Five, who met his gaze evenly. “I’m not staying.”

Klaus didn’t think anything could be as horrifying as the death he’d just found out about, but those words pulled the air from Klaus’s lungs. “Why?”

Five sighed. “I know what it’s like to wander Earth, Klaus. I’d rather not do it again.”

“But it would be different this time,” Klaus said. “You would have me. Heck, you’d have all of us, once I get a grip on my powers.”

Five shook his head. “That’s not fair to any of you. Or me, to be frank.” Five rose to his feet and began pacing in front of Klaus. “Trust me, I’ve thought about this long and hard. I’ve run the calculations. I’ve looked at it from every direction, but the results are the same. It’s best for everyone if I left.” Klaus opened his mouth, but Five sent him a withering, “I’m not finished” stare. “If I stay, it will be infinitely harder for any one of you to move on with your life. And, even if you managed to, you’d all probably feel guilty for leaving ghost-me behind. When, in reality, I am dead. I am gone. Your crappy power just makes everyone believe I’m not.”

“That’s not true,” Klaus said.

“It is,” Five said firmly. “You never mourned Ben’s death, because he was never really dead to you. How could you be expected to mourn something that never left? But he’s really gone now, and you don’t know how to deal with it. I’ve seen you, the last few months. Ever since we got back. You’re even more antsy than usual. You can’t focus.” Five snorted. “Not that focusing was ever a particular skill of yours.”

“That’s not true,” Klaus repeated. Five’s unimpressed gaze made it clear Klaus’s lie was wasted on him.

“So,” Five continued, “one of the results I kept coming up with was that by me ‘walking into the light,’ or whatever you want to call it, you’d get the chance to deal with my death at the same time as everyone else. I think that will be healthy for you.”

“Or,” Klaus fired back, “I go back to using when you leave.”

Five shrugged. “You could. But I don’t think you would. And I especially think you’d have a harder time now that you’re back home. You’d have to make absolutely sure Allison and Diego never found out about it.

“And, speaking of Diego, I meant what I said earlier. I need you to help Diego through this. He doesn’t - he’s not taking it well.”

“I can’t imagine why that would be,” Klaus muttered.

“He’s going to be angry for a while,” Five said as though he hadn’t heard Klaus. “He blames himself. But I had a choice in there, and I made the right call.” Five’s smile was bitter. “Diego has much more to offer this world than I do. I may have saved humanity, but I can’t care for it. And I can do even less as a ghost, so please, Klaus, don’t ask me to stay.”

It struck Klaus then that for all Five’s talk of calculations and objective reasoning, if Klaus begged for him to stay, he would, against his better judgment. He would endure another lifetime on Earth for his siblings. “Fine,” Klaus said, his voice thick. “I won’t.”

Five closed his eyes in relief. “Thank you,” he said sincerely.

“Klaus!” a voice bellowed.

Five winced. “Don’t tell him I’m here,” he said to Klaus. “He won’t accept that I’m dead if you tell him.”

Diego stomped toward them, his hands balled into fists at his sides, a wild gleam in his eyes. “I need to talk to him. Bring him out. Right now.”

Klaus held up his hands placatingly. “Well, now, hold on a seco-”

“I know he’s here! I know he is, so don’t try and tell me he’s not.” Diego whirled to the side, a good 180 degrees from where Five actually stood. “I know you can hear me, Five.”

Klaus looked at Five, who shook his head.

“He’s behind you,” Klaus said, and with a glowing tingle in his fingers, he made Five’s apparition visible. Klaus was letting Five leave forever - the least he could do was talk to his brother before going.

Five scowled. “Klaus!”

Klaus expected Diego to immediately fly off the handle, but he simply stared at Five for a moment. His fingers twitched, and then he said quietly, “What did you do?”

Five rolled his eyes and crossed his arms over his chest. “You’ll have to be more specific, brother dear.”

One of Diego’s hands reached up to grip his own hair. “It wasn’t a blink - I know what your blinks look like. There’s this flash of blue light, and then a second later, you’re somewhere else. This wasn’t that. This was faster. And there was no light. You were in the middle of saying something, and then suddenly you were right next to me. You never even moved from your original spot, but somehow you were right in front of me.” Diego’s breathing grew erratic. “You shoved me, hard. And if you had just stayed, you would have been fine. So I don’t know why you did it, whatever it was.”

Five’s fingers drummed against his upper arm as he seemed to think about whether or not to tell the truth. “I time traveled,” Five finally said. “I went back in time a few seconds.”

“Why?” Klaus said.

Five looked away, but his words were no less biting. “Isn’t it obvious? Because Diego died.”

“So, it was me who got crushed?” Diego said. Klaus had a hard time deciphering Diego’s tone.

“The first time, yes,” Five said.

Diego clenched his hands into fists. “Then why didn’t you go back farther? Why did one of us have to die?”

“You don’t think I tried?” Five snapped. “I’d used up all my power. I wasn’t planning on either one of us being there when the ceiling fell, but I ran out of juice when we both were. I made the call, Diego, and I’d do it again.”

“That’s not fair,” Diego spat, his voice cracking. “Why are you the one who gets to make that call?”

“Because I’m the one who can time travel, genius.”

Klaus winced. Wasn’t Five the one who just said Diego was having a rough time? Five was awful at this.

“Diego.” Five’s tone was nearly soft. “If it were up to me, those kids would have died. I know it, and you know it.”

“You didn’t mean it,” Diego said. “You would have come back for them.”

Five shook his head. “I know that’s what you want to believe about me, but I wouldn’t have. Your life is more valuable to me than theirs. I wasn’t willing to risk it.”

Five’s form flickered. Klaus glanced at his hands, surprised. He hadn’t thought he’d used enough of his powers for them to fade already, so why -?

“Listen, you two,” Five said. “I don’t regret what I did, and you don’t have the right to regret what was never your choice to begin with. And when the others find out, tell them that, too.” The flickering of his body became more erratic.

“This sucks,” Diego said, his voice sounding thick.

“Yeah,” Five said. “But you’ll be okay.” Five’s eyes looked suspiciously wet. “I know you will.” 

Then Five vanished, and Klaus had to press the heels of his hands against his eyes in an attempt to stem the flow of tears. 

“What a stubborn, stupid bastard,” Diego said, and now he was most definitely crying, too. “I can’t wait to kick his ass when I die.”

“Hello?” a little voice said.

Klaus jerked his head to the side. A girl with one arm wrapped in a sling stood nearby, her dark eyes fixed on the two of them.

“Um, hello,” Klaus said, trying to wipe his eyes.

“You knew that kid, didn’t you?” she said. “The kid who died in there.”

Klaus’s throat felt tight. He slid a glance toward Diego, who was staring at the girl seriously. “Yeah, yeah I did. He was my brother. How did you know?”

The girl wrinkled her nose. “I dunno. You look weird, and he was really weird.”

Despite the uncontrollable weeping-breakdown Klaus felt like he was about to have at any moment, he snorted in laughter. “Spot on, kiddo.”

“Plus,” she said, looking at Diego, “you were with us, and it seemed like you knew him.” She took a deep breath. “I never got to tell him thank you for saving my life, and so -” tears were beginning to well in her eyes - “I thought maybe I would tell it to someone who knew him.”

Diego shifted, clasping her uninjured hand between his own. “I appreciate that very much. And I’m sure if my brother were here, he would be happy to hear it.”

The girl’s smile was wavery, and her voice hitched when she said, “I’m sorry that he died.”

Klaus finally allowed the sob that had been building in his chest to bubble out. 

“I am, too,” Diego said softly. He nodded at the ambulances. “You should probably get back before they start worrying.”

The girl nodded.

Klaus waited until she’d walked out of earshot to turn to Diego, his throat still clogged with tears and mucus. “Hear that? Five died a hero.”

Diego scoffed. His cheeks were wet. “Dad would be so proud.”

“Nuh-uh,” Klaus said, lightly shoving Diego’s shoulder. “You’re proud.”

Diego didn’t say anything, but he didn’t have to. Klaus knew he was right.

“I’m still gonna kick his ass when I see him again,” Diego muttered.

Klaus grinned through his tears. “I doubt he’d have it any other way.”