Chapter Text
Five is used to the smell of blood.
He has been for decades. The corpses in the apocalypse didn't bleed much but Five did. He bled when he tripped on debris. He bled when he scavenged through rubble. He bled when he practiced tossing Diego's knives and cut his fingers. He bled when he buried his siblings. He bled when he opened a can of food with a knife and chopped into his hand. He bled from scurvy, blood leaking from his gums. He bled when his scars opened up and dripped blood onto his clothes.
Five bled and bled and bled for decades with no one to see or notice but Delores.
Five has always been so grateful that she didn't have blood. That she didn't have to suffer like he did.
The apocalypse had it's way of worming itself into Five's flesh. It knitted itself within Five's scars. It buried itself in his bones as they merged back together after a break. It carved out space in his body, beneath his skin, where fat and muscle used to be. The apocalypse owned every part of Five and never let Five forget it.
Five is used to the smell of blood.
Five got used to other people's blood with the Commission. He remembers the first time he drew blood, the first time he broke someone else in training. He had to prove he was worth keeping around. That he hadn't lost all his knowledge in the apocalypse. That he was still a killer. He proved that hundreds of times over the years. He proved that to her whenever she asked.
The Commission staked it's claim on Five's body. It created new, fresher scars. It replaced Five's weakened fractured bones with materials more suited to his work. It scrapped out Five's insides and replaced them with something new. Something violent and angry and careful. Something that took great joy in specialized murders. Something that enjoyed playing around like a gazelle in a jungle, exploring how efficiently one could kill. The Commission remade Five's body and mind to be just how they wanted and Five never argued. Never even tried. How could he? Why would he? It was what needed to happen so Five could get back to his family.
Five is used to the smell of blood.
That doesn't make the room any easier to digest. There is blood splattered across the floor along with the bodies. There is a broken chair in pieces against the wall. The only light floods in from the open warehouse doors. The streetlights fill the room, rather than the moon or sun diluted by clouds. There are guns lying around. Rope from tying up a hostage. A hostage that escaped. A kid, some teenager with very rich parents, who got taken to be ransomed.
Five doesn't care about that snot nosed twerp. Five doesn't care about the dead and dying criminals around the room. Five doesn't care about the massive property damage that's been done and how long it'll take the clean (there are other people for that).
Five cares about his brother who looks half gone already.
Five teleports over, pressing his hands on the gushing wound before Diego even notices him there. Diego was shot. There are small grazes that managed to cut through his ridiculous outfit but those are largely harmless. Just nicks on his arms and sides. Annoying, likely to get infected since Diego refuses to listen to Five and take some damn antibiotics, but not lethal.
The gunshot wound in the middle of Diego's torso is not as easily fixed.
"Five?"
"Don't sound so surprised."
Five is definitely damaging Diego's intestines. Five can feel them squishing beneath his fingers. Feel the meat of them against his palms. Diego's muscle is there to but that isn't as disgustingly textured as the intestines. Five is never eating sausage again, but this injury is fixable. Living without all of your intestines is do-able. Five can help Diego find a way to do it, as long as Diego doesn't bleed out. Five just needs Diego not to bleed out.
"How did you get here?"
"Don't waste your energy on talking," Five scolds sharply. "You got the same training I did. You know better than that."
Five pushes harder, hoping the pain will shut Diego up (hoping the blood will stop oozing out so quickly). The sticky substance is coating Five's fingers and palms. It's staining his sleeves. He'll need to buy a new shirt.
"But-"
"Patch told me you were here," Five says. "She said you were probably going to do something ridiculous."
Five owes Patch a fruit basket. That's how people thank people in 2019. Probably.
Five should've grabbed a first aid kit before leaving. He has one in his room. He could've teleported it to himself as he climbed out the window. He would've had what he needed to bandage the wound, bandage Diego's wound, and stop the blood long enough for an ambulance to arrive. Fuck, that would've had what Five needed to give Diego his own blood. Diego doesn't like needles but that doesn't matter. Not like this. Not when-
The blood isn't stopping. It's flowing faster, if anything, which is not what is supposed to happen when pressure is put on a wound.
Five is just…just stalling. Waiting for the paramedics to show up. Then he can violently threaten them to make sure they take care of his damn brother. Then they can do whatever it is they learned with their years in medical school and fix this. Fix the wound his ridiculous brother got saving some worthless kid.
"Five-"
"Shut up Diego."
Five teleported to get here. Well, ran part of the way, teleported the rest. He can't jump that far yet. Not as well versed in spatial jumps. He hasn't been studying them as much as he should've. He got here before Patch, before the other officers, before the paramedics Patch claimed she called. They should get here though. They should be here any second.
"Five, I'll be okay."
Diego's words are slurring together. He has a hand on Five's left hand which Five is deciding to ignore.
"Did you get hurt anywhere else?"
"No. Just t-th-the main thing."
Diego is in shock. When people are in shock they say ridiculous things. They do not realize the gravity of the situation. They do random nonsense that their ridiculous brain deems important. Five has seen it happen dozens of times. It always seems to hit children the worst. Children and older folks. No one has a good time with it.
Five assumes Diego's attempt to stand up is fueled by shock. Surely even Diego isn't that fucking clueless.
"Don't you dare."
"I have to check on the kid," Diego mutters. "He ran off. The-there was a lot of guns. He might've gotten hurt."
"He ran off because he's a useless coward you shouldn't have tried to save. Especially not on your own. Backup was coming, why the hell would you run in? You could've waited. You should've waited."
"He was a kid."
"Oh you're barely an adult yourself."
"I couldn't let B-B-Be-Ben die like that."
Five's hands shake just a bit.
"Ben is already dead."
Five has tried to figure out the math to bring Ben back. He has tried over and over and over again since they got back home. Since they got back from Dallas. Since they reached April 2cd without incident. Five has covered the walls in his room, and the hallway, and the attic, and the other hallway with math. Then he redid the math just to be sure. According to Allison, it took nearly a dozen cans of paint to fix Five's mess. She didn't even try when Five did it again to double check his numbers. The math is still up. Will be until Grace gets around to cleaning it. Five sleeps out there, when he's drunk, and looks over the math searching for an answer that'll never come.
There's no bringing Ben back. Not without potentially ending the world again.
If Five could protect all his siblings without the world it wouldn't matter. All these other people wouldn't matter. But he can't. So Ben has to stay dead.
Ben has to stay dead because Five fucked up time travel over and over and over again. Ben has to stay dead because Five failed to save his younger brother. Ben has to stay dead because Five ruined everything when he jumped at thirteen like the arrogant whiny teenager he was.
Ben did not die in this warehouse. Ben died in another country on a mission. Ben died when the Horror tore him apart.
"No he…he was here. They took him. I couldn't let them take him."
Ben is dead. Diego's broken bleeding in shock brain misunderstanding things doesn't change that.
"The kid is fine," Five mutters, trying to give Diego something else to focus on.
He hasn't tried to save someone from a bullet wound in decades. Normally he's the one shooting. He must've done this with the Academy, once or twice, but he doesn't remember the protocol. The training.
If the old man could see him now…
"Yo-you're sure?" Diego asks. "You saw him?"
Diego's hand is shaking. His expression is far to genuine. To earnest. To concerned for a stranger. A stranger that abandoned him the moment he got the chance. Diego's head is leaning against the ground, angled towards Five. He keeps trying to meet Five's gaze. Desperately trying, even.
Diego is young. So young compared to Five. Five has to look up at his siblings now, especially Luther who absolutely towers over him. They have more life experience with non-apocalypse worlds than he does. That doesn't change…that doesn't change how young they seem to him. How new to life. How unprepared for existence and surviving on their own.
They seem like kids half the time. Whiny, annoying, entirely unreasonable. Scared. Confused. Out of their depth.
"You're going to be fine."
Diego has to be fine. Five refuses to let anything else happen.
"M-M-Mom'll get here soon," Diego agrees quietly.
He's looking towards the warehouse doors now. At the city night lit by buildings that are still standing and running with electricity that hasn't been cut off. He looks like he did when they were kids, flying back from a particularly bad mission. After one of the old man's lectures where he went to far. Or that one time, a reporter mocked Diego for his stutter and Diego had looked to Reginald for help and received nothing but an order to keep his eyes straight ahead.
Grace always loved Diego the most. Or maybe he just tolerated her more than the others did. Five never bothered to figure out the difference.
The angle of Diego's head is agonizingly familiar.
Five remembers seeing Diego asleep like that, on the rare occasion Five had to wake him up for breakfast. Head tilted, knife clutched in his hand like a children's stuffed animal, drooling into his pillow. Five had enjoyed waking him up in the most annoying way possible.
Five remembers seeing Diego dead like that when he first arrived in the apocalypse. When Five dug through the rubble of his home and found them all lying there.
Not them all. Not Ben. Not Viktor. Just the other four. The first four.
Diego looks the same as he did then. Same blood dripping down his forehead. Same outfit. Same knives. Same angle of his ridiculous head. Same hair cut. Same brother.
Five's hands are sitting in his lap as he watches Diego's unmoving chest. Five's hands are sitting in his lap as he registers Diego's blank eyes and slack jaw. Five's hands are sitting in his lap as he notices that Diego Hargreeves has died once again at twenty-nine years old.
Five is not buying Patch a fruit basket.
"Diego."
Five shakes Diego's shoulders. Tries to get Diego to say something, do something, react somehow.
"Diego stop playing around. It isn't fucking funny."
Diego does nothing. His body is still warm but there is no movement in his eyes, chest, hands, arms, lungs, there is nothing there. It is a husk of what his brother used to be.
"God damn it Diego we don't have time for this."
Five is not burying Diego again. He buried him in the apocalypse. He watched Diego die to a nuclear strike in Dallas. He was present as Diego got shot in that damn barn and hit the ground already dead. He has witnessed his brother die three fucking times and Five refuses for there to be a fourth.
"I stopped for a second. It was just a second."
Five didn't put pressure on Diego's wound for 52 seconds. He can feel it in his bones, or wherever his power is stored. Five stopped putting pressure at 22 hours, 34 minutes, and 55 seconds. He started putting pressure again at 22 hours, 35 minutes, and 47 seconds. It wasn't that long. Diego should've survived that long without Five.
Diego does not respond.
"It was just-it wasn't that long Diego. That isn't fair. I was here for the rest of it. I've been here almost every time. You can't-I was here," Five tells Diego, grabbing him by the shoulders, "I was here this time. I'm here. I only left once. You don't-it isn't your turn. It doesn't get to be your turn."
Diego does not respond.
"It was less than a minute Diego. It was 52 seconds. Fifty-fucking-two. I fought to get back to you for forty-five years. You can't leave over 52 seconds. It isn't fair. That isn't fair."
Diego does not respond.
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry about Dallas, I'm sorry I let you go out on your own tonight, I'm sorry I stopped paying attention. I'm sorry. You-you win. You win Diego. You were right and I was wrong, I was the asshole, just come back and rub it in my face already."
Diego does not respond.
"You win. I'll let you win."
Diego does not respond.
Diego does not respond when Patch shows up and cries over his body. Diego does not respond to the paramedics as they avoid his corpse. Diego does not respond to the cops who gather around nearby.
Diego does not respond.
For the fourth time, Diego can not respond. For the fourth time, Five failed his brother. For the fourth time, Five rewinds time to get another chance.
Five refuses to let there be a fifth.