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The first thing he hears are leaves rustling. And slowly he is aware that this is not where he's supposed to be.
He opens his eyes, meeting them with a little girl.
She sniffs, looking at him uninterested. Her hat covering most of her face, and with a jolt he realizes he isn't at home.
He looks around, birds paint the sky and a lake stands in the middle. Wood platform going into it.
A lady dips her legs into it, her curly blonde hair styled short. Her blouse a royal blue, flowers decorating the back. Heart shaped sunglasses staring off. She hums a nameless tune. Her nails painted red. Dolores, his wife that he left, was here. Actually here. Not a dream
(Or maybe it was and he was just asleep.)
(Five, please wake up, please. Please.)
She turns around, her eyes catching him and she smiles. Making her way over, she waves at the little girl.
"Five, honey, what are you doing here?"
"Where is this place, Dolores? Where are my siblings."
Her eyes get a little sad,"Do you not remember?"
He scowls,"Remember what?"
"Your death." She says plainly. No, absolutely not he can't die he needs to.....what? He needs to what. He has to protect his family, without him they'll fall apart.
"Bring me back," The girl looks at him oddly" I need to go back."
"Five, darling, you can't."
"Why?"
"Because—" Dolores looks at the girl,"—because you've died, and there's nothing you can do."
Five has not been known to give up easily. He wasn't going to start now.
"Where is the person in charge." Because there's always a person. Whether it's a simulation or something else there's always someone. This all smells like the Commission, if it's some stupid attempt to stop him
"Five—"
"Where?" He's so close to screaming at her, he's frustrated. She's supposed to be help, she said it herself,once. "I help because that's my job." And she's not being helpful at the moment. He opens his mouth ready to argue.
"This is interesting," The little girl say and he's very suddenly aware of how dull the world is, how colorless it looks. This was a very poor attempt to capture.
"Where is he?"
She hums, her hands reaching for the flowers.
"You're more stupid than the other one," she says," Although I like you better."
"Y'know," he narrows his eyes." If you're going to threaten me, you should know I am going to escape."
She picks the flowers, holding it lightly," I know."
"Then?"
"I'm bored," She says as though it would explain everything.
Dolores glances at him, he glances back.
Five does the only thing he knows how to.
He grins.
Did you hear?
The wind blows and the ocean sways.
Did you hear?
The boy of time has finally died.
Atropos has cut his string.
(Snip.)
Did you hear?
The blood flows and flows. The river is stained red.
Did you hear?
He was born dead.
(Snip.)
Efa liked the way the ocean stood still. She liked the way there wasn't any noise coming from it. She likes the salty air that assaults her nose.
She likes the seclusion.
"Hello, Efa."
That seclusion is now ruined.
It wasn't supposed to be like this. Not so bloody and gory. Because, at least for Klaus, Five was invincible. He was a stubborn bastard. A figure nobody could touch, or cut, kill even. He fought professionally, professionally and dirty. Using any weaknesses, hesitations, anything, to have the upper hand. For awhile he did.
The illusion ended when one of the Sparrows landed a hit, stab, shot. Whatever. The point was that they landed a hit. Klaus thought that he was going to get up, he always does after all, what's so different now? He should get up, shaking his limbs and smiling a crooked smile. He doesn't.
His pale corpse unseeing, a nasty bruise forming on his temple. Blood flowed as if would never stop. His eyes fluttering shut. He's seen death. Corpses but never his siblings. He remembers Dave, who died without a sound. No last words or anything.
"Five? Fuck. Five!"
He looked like he could sleeping, maybe one of those nights where Grace picks up and carries him to his bedroom. Maybe Mr. Pennycrumb is tucked under him and maybe those space blankets are pulled over him and when he wakes up with a streak of drool and with a bed head that makes him look like Einstein, he gets up and makes a joke about them being idiots for doubting him. He gets up. He supposed to wake up. He's supposed to wake up. Very belatedly he realizes he's knelt down. His hands shake Five.
They are not his hands, it feels as if he's seeing someone else is doing it and he's just a bystander. Seeing someone else shake him, seeing someone else cry, seeing someone bend over a corpse.
Wake up. Wake up. Wake up.
(He doesn't wake up.)
A long guttural scream echoes through the air, and when he feels pain and his vocal cords raw with grief, he realizes he's screaming. Ben tries to comfort him, his hand goes through. Other Ben runs over to a girl with the ravens and the glasses and the rest of his siblings scream, murmur and talk. But he doesn't want to talk because he's dead Five is dead and so is Dave, they're both dead.
Someone grabs him and they run.
"We just killed a kid, Marcus! Fuck! We just killed a kid!"
"I know, I know."
Five dies in a pool of his own blood.
The last image he sees is Klaus face pulled into a surprised shout.
Will people mourn him?
He hopes not, it'll be awkward.
(A war will start because of him.)
They steal a car. Blood coats the inside.
The thing about Luther is that he hates blood, it's not a well known fact mostly because he doesn't react to it. He just shuts down. He hates it.
Allison knows this because when Ben and her came after a particularly bloody mission, they talked normally. Sure he had lost a little color but he didn't say anything and that was that. She listened to Luther throw up later that night.
Five's body is cold and dead. That and bloody. If he wasn't breathing she would've thought he did something so him. She wouldn't have questioned it.
(If it wasn't for the screaming and the crying from Klaus, and if he wasn't breathing. He wasn't breathing.)
(Ben died differently, he died screaming and yelling. He died fighting the horror. Five died fighting, but he died quietly, without a sound. He just accepted it.)
(Was it peaceful for him?)
(For any of them?)
(Everything feels fuzzy.)
Five sits in the middle, slumped over, he looks almost peaceful. There is no old man posture. "Where are we going to go?" Vanya asks, her shoulders hunched," Five's dead. And we just got him back." She stifles a sob." We just got him back." Her lips tremble, her hands shake. Diego tries to comfort her. "It's okay Vanny, everything will be okay."
Klaus pulls out cigarette, his hands still stained with blood. Luther looks pained, his hands straining against the wheel, his knuckles going white.
"For all we know he might not be dead!" Luther with a waiver in his tone says. "This might be another elaborate plan."
Allison takes a breath.
"No offense, big guy, but I don't think you can talk." Klaus says," I mean you didn't have to see it." He laughs, a hysterical, broken laughter.
Luther sneers," You aren't the only suffering here, Klaus! We are literally driving with his corpse."
"You didn't have to—" Something catches her attention.
Five's jet black hair is messed up. He wouldn't like that. She carefully brushes it to the side," Guys!" Diego interrupts." Jésus, we can't keep arguing! We need a plan."
"Five's dead—"
"Thank you for sugarcoating that."
"—We need a game plan so we don't end up like him."
The car goes silent, the only noise being the revving engine.
His hair is matted with blood.
"Why did you sell me to Reginald?" He says to Efa, his mother. She's on the paler side, the sun highlighting it. Sitting on a deck chair and a cooler to her right side. Her nails a deep red.
"Didn't want kids." Then Efa decides that isn't a good answer, "I was a teen, and we weren't the richest." Her hair a night-without-stars black, shades on her eyes. A pinkish color. She had an accent, Irish maybe?
"And you didn't want kids."
"And I didn't want kids."
She grabs a beer, jutting it forward to him. She inclines her head to him.
"Can you even get drunk in the afterlife?" He asks shaking his head, he needed to be sober for this.
"Maybe. Wouldn't know. I only drink beers."
They get silent after a bit.
"How're your siblings?" She continues to look ahead. The ocean is eerly still.
"Fine," he says.
"Had seven myself, two more on the way before my mama died." She swirls the beer," I was the oldest." She has a small, reminiscent smile," One of my siblings were taller than me, a giant. We called him Blunderbore. Too tall, a giant but soft, cried when we had to butcher bunnies." After the giant in Jack and the bean stalk.
He nods, he knows how that feels. He sits down on the sand. Being the oldest and the shortest wasn't the best to have authority.
"Why are you here?" She asks.
"Wanted to ask questions."
"Ask them then, I don't have much time to waste."
He snorts," Isn't the afterlife supposed to have unlimited timing?"
She shrugs, smiling. "Aren't you to young to be in the afterlife?"
"I'm fifty-eight years old." She doesn't say anything, just hums.
The clouds stay still.
That was the only question he had. Why did you give me away to a vile man? He got his answer.
Except—
"Did you regret giving me to him?"
She takes sip of the beer," Yeah." She pauses.
"The moment I saw you on TV I regretted it."
And— that actually gives him peace of mind. She regretted it and she couldn't do anything about it. He was a millionaire, with thousands of lawyers to back him up. It was cruel but that was life.
"Didn't even try to hide his face." She mumbles. Taking off her glasses he finally sees her eyes, the same green eyes he sees in the mirror.
The sound of a bicycle comes around and he knows it's time. He stands, dusting the sand off his uniform.
"Cheers." She says raising her beer that surprisingly hasn't run out. He nods to her.
"Goodbye."
The day is sunny, without clouds the skies shines a beautiful blue and the birds fly overhead. Ironic for such a day.
They bury him in a park. It's close to some house Klaus got from an old lady from the sixties.
He doesn't even get a gravestone. Just some rocks and flowers.
Diego doesn't cry. Even if the pressure builds behind his eyes he doesn't cry, even if he seems so small when Luther lowers him into a grave they dug, his head lolling to the side as if he was simply drunk or napping, and to anyone else he might've looked like it. Without the blood he could've looked like it.
Without the ugly bruise those Sparrows did, without the blood they spilled, without the corpse they made, he could've been alive.
He could have been alive.
What did the swedish say?
An eye for an eye.
"If you see this group we urge you to report them, as they are wanted by the FBI, the local police, and the CIA, they are dangerous, I repeat, they are dangerous."
"You killed my brother, Marcus." The girl says, her face stricken with grief he's often seen on a victims family.
Never on the enemies.
"It wasn't supposed to happen." It was self-defense, he wanted to scream, he was going to kill us. He saw it, the way his smile became dangerous, maybe like Ben's. Kill or be killed.
"He's still dead."
Sound apologetic, sound regretful. Make them think twice about revenge.
"I know."
"You've declared war, Marcus." Her face is turned into a sneer," You've declared war and the battlefield is going to be bloody. Just know their blood is on your hands." The porcelain cup shakes. "On all of your hands." A crow squawk's just outside of the cafe.
She isn't thinking twice about revenge.
(This usually works.)
"Maybe we can negotiate before we take drastic measures, your siblings might get hurt." Her eyes narrow.
The crow squawk's again.
She leans over," I've ended the world, twice.
What's a few more bodies under my name?"
With that she throws the cup to the window where the crow is, hitting the window ,making a spider web of cracks and scaring it off.
"Remember that when you see the massacre."
"So they want revenge."
Ben shrugs. "That's what she said."
Jayme sighs," Did they not learn from last time? We're more powerful than them."
Alfonso nods," We could take them, correction, we did take them and won."
Sloane frowns, she sits next to the hostage.
"Vanya did that?"
Sloane looks at him," Can you talk her out of it?"
He smiles, all teeth, maybe more like snarl.
"No."
If it's a refusal or a fact, no one knows.
"Hello dad." The boy from the sixties says, his face stretched into a unnatural grin.
"How are you doing?"
He goes to correct him, he's not his dad, not anymore.
"I—"
The boy isn't letting him speak.
"Good, good."
He goes where the couch is, his hand trailing it.
"Y'know you killed Five." It's a statement. Not a question.
He doesn't know who that is, he voices as such. The boy laughs. No one has told a jest.
"Oh, you hear that, Ben?"
A sob or maybe a laugh echoes through out, the boys lips never move.
"I am sorry for whoever you lost, but in this world it's kill or be killed and unfortunately your brother was the one who was killed."
"So your a hypocrite in every universe, got it."
There's a knock at the door.
They open it cautiously, only to find a package.
"We can't open it."
"We have to, I mean what if it's a truce?" Sloane, the optimistic of the family, says.
An argument bursts.
In the end they open it.
Pogo's head rolls out, the room stills.
Jayme gags.
A notes attached, Chris reads it.
"Your move."
Ben says something they all relate to.
"Fuck."
"Allison what's wrong?" She sobs.
"Claire's gone."
Grieving is hard, especially if you have a kid.
"Stan."
He looks up from his phone, his head minutely going to a picture of the Hargreaves family. Five smiling smugly. Allison smiling, all teeth and with rosy cheeks. Luther standing straight trying to take up the picture and Vanya holding her violin case proudly. Klaus subtly flipping the camera off and Ben laughing. Reginald's cut out, his face a jagged hole. He silently thanks the younger him who did it.
He has mostly fuzzy memories of it, never remembering more than something someone said or did that pissed Reginald off.
He found it in his pockets, forgetting he put there in the first place. He smiles at the way he seems almost happy in that picture.
"Who's that?" Stan asks, his finger pointing at Five. "Never seen him before." A slim Jim in his hand, where did he get that?
"That's because he's dead." Stan jumps at the statement.
"Mom said—"
"She doesn't know, Stan." His fingers going to the bridge of his nose, a headache's coming on.
"Oh."
They fall into silence for awhile.
"How did he die?"
"Jesus Christ, Stan, you can't say that."
Stan stays silent, his mouth turned into frown.
"We—it." He sighs," Blood loss. It was blood loss."
"Oh."
He nods, that's how he feels.
Vanya runs into his room," The Sparrows are here." Her mouth turned into a a grim line.
The night is young, full of stars and a full moon illuminating the streets beautifully.
The night is also full of bruises, blood, and revenge.
Lila throws the first punch, a sickening crack filling the night with the first taste of revenge. Diego fights with her, his knives nicking leg.
The rest follow.
Vanya kneeing someone in the stomach, then punching them in the face when they get up, causing more then a few black eyes. The cube starts to float toward her until she throws them into the cube. Kicking and kicking while they're down fighting dirty
"I heard a rumor—" The girl seems to notice this is her power and spits something at her. And she starts to look around wildly. The girl swipes her knees making Allison buckle and fall to the floor where she's promptly knocked out.
Luther fights the leader, his fists connecting to anything he can find, the leader fight back. His fists connecting with his face. Luther doesn't flinch.
Ben and Klaus fight other Ben, their tentacles and the ghosts making them virtually impossible.
What's eventually their downfall is Alfonso, he's holding Stan, a black crawling up into his eye.
"Let my family go." He announces, trying to emulate.
Video comment:
"Guys! Some guy just climbed out of a hole or grave whatever. But he was glowing and shit And he pets my dog???? I'm really scared."
Video ID: A dog, probably a pitbull, is standing near hole sniffing around. The hole is dug deep and blue static seems to circle around it.
1k Comments:
@Lady Anna
Holy shit I saw some group there like earlier that day.
@Thecomedocotor
First!
@Thegrinchmylove
I think it might be edited
@Gigachad
Off topic but that dog is really cute.
Ben was mourning, his tears staining his cheeks, maybe if the blue would just leave.
He realizes that maybe he should open his eyes first.
So he does and a throbbing soreness, a burning sensation, and he suddenly feels everything. He's alive.
(He's alive alive alive.)
He can feel the frost sinking in like a ship, he can feel it.
"Holy— Five?!" He's blue, his everything is blue. His skin a brilliant blue.
(But his clothes, his clothes aren't blue. They're torn and bloody, his hair is still matted with blood.
"Five, please wake up, please. Please." Klaus cries and sobs, big fat tears rolling down.)
("Dad? Dad, pleas I'll summon them, please!" Big fat tears falling down chubby cheeks.)
He's glitching almost, as if the earth can't decide if there's two of them. His hair floating as though gravity decided there was an exception.
Most importantly he's here.
"Five? Five, wait—"
Stan just wanted to see the fight. He's done it countless of times, in his mom's apartment their used to be countless fights.
How was it his fault he wanted to see it? He's seen the blood, all of that before.
But then he was caught by this dude who had half his face melting off, he held him place even when he hit, he hit back with some kind of power?
Worst of all he's lost his slim Jim.
And then his dead (fake) uncle comes back to life and he's glowing! Actually glowing!
He starts to float towards him, his pale, almost white, blue eyes staring intently at him.
"Umm. Hi." And he starts to walk closer to him and Stans really fucking nervous, Lila never said anything about something like this.
Diego unfreezes running to Stan and standing in front.
"Five." He says and his head snaps to him. Wow that's creepy." Five, what happened? You were dead." Diego says his voice cracking but he's not answering.
Five just keeps looking at him, at Stan.
"Five—"He stays in front of Stan, stretched out to try to make himself look bigger. "—Five, please, what's happening?" He raises a crystal blue hand and he pulls.
Halfway across town an old man seizes in pain.
(Across the multiverse thousands of the same man drop dead.)
"What are you?" The old man asked.
The boy answers.
"I am God's Apostle.
And I am going to slaughter you like she intended."
Reginald Hargreaves dies from a heart attack.
At least that's what the paper says.
The bruise circling around his neck says otherwise.
The weird angle of his neck says otherwise.
Blue engulfs everything.
Luther wakes up in a house. His childhood bedroom decorated just has he remembered it.
When he finds the stairs Five's sitting down in the dinner table.
Didn't he die? Was it a dream?
His siblings trickle in.
Ben's alive.
Ben's alive! Some tears are involved, and hugs are definitely involved.
"So what was that?" Klaus asks holding Ben in a hug.
"I made a deal with—"
"The little girl?" Klaus adds, who is that?
Five nods.
"So what?" He asks.
"You can't send me back without a purpose?"
"It's the rules." The cowboy says, is this really happening to him? A cowboy, technically a god, talking to him.
"Didn't you make the rules?"
The cowboy rolls his eyes," I'm the devil, of course I did."
"So?"
"It's so we don't go drunk with power."
The little girl nods," We want you to do something when you go back. Reginald Hargreaves is a mistake that shouldn't have happened. Yet he has evaded the attempts to fix the mistake."
"You want me to kill him."
The little girl and the cowboy nods.
"Fine."