Work Text:
A window clicks back in place.
“Number Five”
Shit
“Dad”
At the doorframe Reginald Hargreeves stands stern as ever.
“Why is it that you have an ill creature in your arms?”
Double Shit
“It was raining and-”
“Enough with the stalling. Out with it, boy”
Clutching the sick pup
“Just one day”
“Absolutely not. I forbid you. Now hand it over”
Five held the pup closer to his heart, trying to shield it from the cruel man.
“Stalling will get you nowhere Number Five. Now cease your rebellion.”
Inhuman. Decrepit hands stretch out.
Waiting
No other option. Never.
“Where will you take him?”
Stern and unwavering.
A small whine escaped the pup's mouth.
“That is none of your concern Number Five.”
A scoff.
“Of course.”
Five was
worried
irritated.
Honestly he could go for a strong drink or two right about now.
Something was off about this Hargreeves infested landscape, and the Keepers were just the tip of the iceberg. People believing that they existed from a different timeline was no new phenomenon, easy fix just call them crazy. No one would know the better whether the memories were real or just a case of insanity. They were just memories after all, no visible evidence. Except for the fact that the showcased Umbrella Academy artifacts were in fact very visible evidence. Shit.
The items from the other timeline showed proof that this timeline wasn't as stable as he originally hoped for. When does anything go as he hopes for? Christ, it's like a curse.
Pushing away dislike, Five thought if anyone had an answer to creating a non-world-ending timeline it was dad. For all of his mistreatment he was right about alot of things, but the world seemed to be slowly unraveling at its seams and he wasn't so sure the old man had stopped doomsday from coming. Meaning, probably another problem to fix.
He returned to his assassin-like stalking tendencies (not that he ever left them) and tried to gather as much information he could of the Keepers. The Keepers were quite big, he had filed many faces and names of powerless people holding memories of a different timeline. Jean and Gene seemed to be the ones who were most aware-slash-in-charge of the situation. All he ended up gathering was that the timelines seemed to be merging, and that something or someone would bring about the event they named The Cleanse. The Keepers wanted to cause this Cleanse to quote make there timeline right again. Whether The Cleanse spelt the end of the world or is just a widely popular cult fantasy, he was still working on the probability.
After the disaster of a family car trip they stopped by a car repair place. Where he lasted three minutes listening to the family squabble before scoffing saying that he was off to get a cup of coffee. Rounding the corner he took a glance at his family before blinking away. Honestly he should get a gold star for how long he lasted. Only to find himself back at the subway station for the third time. Sighing he began to pace in a small circle, arms flailing while muttering annoyances.
Dodgy damn marigold
Ever since getting his powers back it seemed like he had lost any sense of control over it. Five attempts to blink back but of course like everything in his life, it doesn’t work out like how it should. Not even a pathetic sputter of blue light. A pathetic sputter of blue light. This is tragic. Now that Five has confirmed that this marigold is ass he can continue on more important things.
Coffee
Or anything that would give his powers the juice they need, but preferably coffee. Maybe it's not energy but emotion. Five scoffed emotions are irrelevant, solvable equations are not. Pulling his hands in front of him.
“Come on just a little…”
This time there was a small sputter so pathetic he wished it didn't even sputter at all.
Five sighed, putting his hands down before looking at the train ominously open for no one but him.
His powers so obviously wanted to point out that this place was important but Five also obviously didn't want to partake in any of the importance.
Retirement. Was that so hard?
With a little, tiny, inconsequential amount of threatening he joined the CIA in hopes to settle his paranoia of an impending apocalypse, so yes, it was very hard. Besides, as unwilling as he was to go into the station, Five was also aware of how foolish it would be to not investigate a potential threat or better yet clue to the timeline, especially one that his powers were now interconnected to. He's not braindead.
Five sighed, he didn’t know how he felt about his powers at this point. It had saved him for the better part of forty five years from collapsing buildings or unstable flooring. On the other hand it was what got him stuck in the first place. Not to mention the whole stranding-siblings-across-time shenanigans.
At first when he lost his powers to the reset, Five felt lost, a gaping hole had settled in his chest. For the first few years he had tried to fill it with any liquor he could get his hands on and let the world fuzz away. As he adjusted to the new world, Five took pleasure in the mundane after a lifetime of being extraordinary. Taking things slow had never been his motto but he was adaptable. Screw feeling sorry over what's done.
In all honesty going to the train would be a shot in the dark at best. Five grimaced, even at a young age he hated being in the unknown. The possibility of missing something vital to the survival of his family would tear Five apart. He's come so far for it to fall apart now. His fear was irrelevant.
Perhaps he should check if there are any disturbances in the other timeline, if there were any telltale signs of the merging timelines causing problems . And if this timeline does not in fact hold up perhaps he could find one to house his family in without ending the world. Fourth times the charm right?
Or perhaps it was all in his head. With the other situations he was aware that the world would come to an end creating plans with the cold hard facts that he had. At this point in time he wasn't even sure if remnants of the other timelines would cause this one to end. Maybe the timelines aren't merging in a catastrophic way, it could be symbiotic. Besides the keepers couldn’t cause so much trouble. They were ordinary after all, he scoffed and Viktor was not so ordinary after all…
For a split second Five considered if he should wait for his powers to function and bring Lila, the only one of his family who had experience in working with time through the commission (Diego was a total fluke) and at least had half a brain. Then he shook his head with a grimace. Five honestly didn't want to get more involved in the building tension between his idiot brother and his psycho-laser-eye-wielding-ex-assassin wife. How she acquired laser eyes who the fuck knows, Five has more important problems. Working alone was more comfortable anyways, old apocalyptic habits die hard.
Knowing from previous time travel track records, dragging along the family only made things go to absolute shit. Having to explain his bare bones of a plan to them was not something that he wanted to entertain. Five was more likely to rip out his ear bone before he finished explaining.
Time is a fickle thing to mess with. The last several attempts of time traveling had left his family on the verge of breaking. Hell even he couldn't run from the damage, faces amongst ash flickered through his mind. Five cursed, shitty ass memories with shitty ass timing.
Distraction
Distraction
Fishing out his notebook Five began to look around the train station.
The air was stale, giving off a claustrophobic atmosphere. The station was clean. Clean in the way that showed no one had stepped foot in the place. Though he could've sworn he's been here. Nothing looked out of place, oddly enough he was able to read the symbols without realizing that the words weren't in any recognisable language. Perhaps he had encountered these symbols during his time in the commision Five dismissed, nevertheless he jotted down the words Station 145413. With that Five walks towards the train’s door entrance.
Five stands in front of the open door for what feels like a century. Well, he thought, time to make use of the family's stupidity trait. Stepping into the train.
Five steps out to see a familiar-not-so-familiar subway station, jaw tense and hands clenched tightly to the point of drawing blood. This stopped marked his tenth and maybe, maybe, he was lost. Suddenly the setting shifted to one of ash, concrete rubble sprawled on the floor and dead bodies scattered around burnt beyond recognition. For a second he could have sworn he heard Delores’s sweet nothings as she always did to try and lighten the mood. He turned his head ready to speak his frustrations to Delores when suddenly the setting shifted back to that of the subway station. Where there was no Delores…
Five cursed, he thought he’d never had to see anything remotely like that place again.
-
Five stepped out of the train jotting down in his notebook anything significant the previous eighth stop had shown. The little town was no more, replaced by towering buildings and a thriving city. Things had advanced far faster in that timeline then the others but nothing out of the ordinary occurred as far as he could tell.
In textbook commission ordinary that is, though he stopped completely relying on those guidelines a while ago. Or perhaps a kugelblitz ago.
Though he had yet to report anything off with the timelines (some in fact looked like perfect getaway timelines for emergencies- not that he knew how to get back to those timelines sigh) as far as Five could tell, everything was as normal as they could be. But, Five couldn't stop the panic from settling in his bones, considering he had planned to go back to his own timeline after seeing the fifth timeline. He had thought he went back towards the direction he came from only to find himself in yet another timeline. As he stewed in his panic tracing his fingers on the map for a route the train stopped, marking his ninth stop as he stepped out.
The atmosphere was eerie, lights flickered and it looked run down, abandoned. Each step echoed a gravel crunch throughout the area. All the pristine white tile that ran along the walls were chipped and stained. Rats and cockroaches skittered across the floor. The temperature had dropped several degrees, confirmed by the puffs of white fog from every exhale. The lump in his throat grew larger as Five made his way above ground.
crunch
crunch
crunch
crun-
His stomach dropped and at that second any content still left inside Five's stomach came back out his mouth.
“Shit”
He cursed. Such a waste.
He tried to look around but dark spots danced around his vision. Five didn’t understand what was playing with his vision until he realized that he was hyperventilating.
Five, breathe.
Delores says as gentle as ever.
Okay, breathe
Hes got this.
Breathe
Breathe
In
1 2 3 4
Hold
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Out
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Repeat
Just like that the dark spots slowly dissipated from his vision as he got his breathing under control. Five muttered a small thanks to Delores. In which she returned with slight scolding dressed in a gentle tone. He wasn't entirely sure what she had said, head still muddled post panic attack, but he nodded anyway.
Once his senses came back to him he realized that this place was abnormally cold. Now that Five was aware of his teeth chattering and body quivering, he wouldn't be surprised if he caught a case of hypothermia.
Five looked around, mingled with the blankets of ice and rubble stood unnaturally still bodies.
At first the bodies and collasped buildings had caused overwhelming fear to chain him down. Five had thought that by some fucked up fate he had found himself back in his forty five year prison. Upon further inspection he was glad to report that this was in fact not his apocalypse.
“Delores, are you seeing this?”
Five called out horror seeping in his naturally confident voice, but Delores had gone silent
Five stood rooted in shock.
As far as he could tell these bodies had been frozen to death rather than the fiery one when the moon came crashing down. Though the fact that Five could see every inch of fear on their faces preserved and frozen made him almost wish it had been burnt corpses. All Five could do at the moment is stare in horror.
fi..ve
A murky voice
F...ive
Who?
Five!
Delores?
FIVE
YOU NEED TO GET OUT!
Delores pushed in an urgent tone. Frazzled he looked around the icy landscape. Nothing seemed out for blood or on the verge of collapsing. Not environment, so his body? Numb. His hands were numbing up as if he shot anesthsetic into them. Five looked down at his hand, frosted and rapidly gaining a dark purple color.
“Shit!”
Quickly set his hand in front of him and blinked into the station where the train sat waiting.
Now the blink fucking works, damn it all.
-
Back at the station Five griped and relaxed his hands in repetition, thankfully, they had turned back to pink. Dodgy train station aside- couldn't they afford a heater? Or even complementary liquor? Might as well add a coffee machine. Five scoffs. Almost losing his fingers because he couldn’t get a handle on his fear was not his finest moment and all he could do was marinate in his anger. If it had not been for Delores he would’ve been added to that timeline’s morbid popsicle collection.
God, he missed her.
He never knew how much he had missed Delores. Ever since the universe reset her voice had gone quieter each passing year, being surrounded by people had drowned her voice out. He tried not to dwell on her absence, dwelling never did anyone good. Instead, he wrapped the noise of strangers around him without cleaning the cuts in his heart.
YOU NEED TO GET OUT!
Still rang through his skull like a pinball. That frozen hellscape had made her voice the clearest they had been for the past six years. Actually it's been awhile since Five messed up so bad for that tone to be directed towards him.
Five sighed.
He's getting too old for this.
Another train was making its way towards the station. With a slight screech it came to a stop and the backwards announcer was back at it again.
Already?
Five tried to gulp down the lump in his throat. If his hands were shaking, that was nobody's problem. He couldn't afford to rest, not until he found his way home. He wondered how much time had passed since leaving the family to squabble at the car repair shop, being in the apocalypse had muddled his sense of time (though he is sure it's only been a day). A small part of him hoped that at least someone was thinking about his whereabouts.
Suddenly guilt began to eat at him. He had never planned to leave them the first time and now he had left them again. Having missed so much of his siblings' lives sometimes felt as if Five was trying to save emotionally unstable man-children wearing the face and history of his siblings. He never let that get to his head though, accepting that they were alive and able to live out the rest of their lives is what mattered. He wasn’t looking for happy anyway.
Selfishly. Five sometimes wished he had at least one of his simple minded siblings with him. Although they wouldn't be of any use in finding a way out, they sure as hell would be better company than the backwards announcer that he found himself berating to. Then again he was also relieved that his siblings would not have to endure this type of loneliness. The type that made him want to curl into a helpless ball like some little kid and talk so loud to make his brain think for a second that there were still people around. Quite pathetic really.
A little part of him had always wondered what it'd be like to have at least one of them around
…or if he had never left at all
No use in thinking of the what ifs. He was too old for sad feelings.
Slumping onto a seat near the door he opened his notebook, Five tried to distract himself with all the information acquired trying to piece together facts with them, but hazy images of ash and fire with an occasional icy undertone kept on interrupting his concentration. Then a thought passed over his head, back straightening Five proceeded to slam the notebook over his face.
How could he not look around in the train itself.
Five had been so preoccupied with the timelines themselves that he completely forgot to check the device that was allowing him to get to the timelines. Eyes began darting around, mind reeling. There must be some kind of control system he could gain access to rather than just blindly hopping on trains and praying. Or even some kind of clue left by anyone who had boarded the train before him.
Looking around, nothing seemed all too out of place. Spotless glass windows. A handful of speakers scattered around for his little announcer friend. Advertisements and seats lined the walls. Caution and safety advice stuck on the doors. Everything was printed in the same symbol text. The writing is concerningly familiar. He was about to stand and walk around when.
Bleh-
Five covered his nose.
What is that smell?
It's like he's back in that elevator with Luther.
The smell was wafting in the air. It smelled like shit. Literal shit. Did it always smell like this? Standing straight as an arrow Five looks around for the source. Then his eyes still on a tiny chunk of brown. There several feet away he finds a small piece of feces on the floor.
What the fuck?
He sure as hell did not shit himself in the train
…right?
But he was the only one here…
Five closed his eyes.
A deeply disturbed expression settled on his face.
His only conclusion was that he had already gone insane without realizing.
There is no way in the deepest parts of hell-
A very long, deep breath.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Exhale.
God this is shitty.
Five looked around in denial.
Left
Right
Up (he's desperate)
Down-
Gasp
At the corner of his eye he caught a splotch of copper on the floor. His eyes zeroed in at the figure on the floor.
His heart skipped a beat.
There laid a small dog no- puppy across his seat. Carefully tucking itself in the shadows under the seats.
Had it been here this whole time?
Five wouldn't know since he spent most of his time furiously scribbling down notes of each stop and location on his notebook or jotting his potential location on the map.
Limbs somehow losing ability to function smoothly, Five scrambled towards the pup like some frazzled ape. Luther would appreciate his movement.
Once inches away Five stayed deathly still on his knees in front of the puppy.
The pup didn't move.
Was it dead?
Five was hesitant, eyes blown wide and a hand shakily above the fur. He didn't want to get his hopes up, maintaining hope in the apocalypse was a double edged sword. On one hand it gave him strength to move forward, on the other hand it cut deep when yet another attempted jump failed. Honestly anything happy in the apocalypse was a double edged sword.
His heart ached.
His stomach twisted so much that Five thought he was gonna throw up again. Cold sweat trickled down his forehead as he grit his teeth, fear of the unknown overtaking his body.
Shutting his eyes Five slowly lowered his hand until he felt fur as soft as the bear he had once left behind. Warmth radiated off the thing and relief flushed through every cell of his body. The breath that he hadn't known he was holding was released as something wet slid down his cheek.
Warm.
Scalding even, this pup was radiating heat, far different from the ice cold bodies of his siblings he had buried in the apocalypse. It looked up beady eyes staring down at his own. Chocolate brown to green.
“ ...hey….bud ”
His voice croaked as he patted the pup on the head. It tilted its head at Five giving what he pegged as the puppy eyes. Five takes a breath, eyes softening and lets out a whisper.
“Let's go home.”