Chapter Text
This is getting ridiculous. It’s been two weeks since the following has occurred:
1) Viktor revealed he's had powers their entire lives
2) Klaus revealed Ben's ghost has been here since he died back in October
3) Ben also revealed they all have a part in solving Five's disappearance
And nothing has come out of it so far.
Well, not exactly. Viktor has been surprisingly good at training his powers and was able to levitate Klaus for two minutes yesterday. It's still strange—Viktor's powers. Everything that has happened with him recently is unexpected. Two years ago Allison wouldn't have thought they'd be working themselves towards being friends, bonding and helping him with training his powers.
They've managed to hide it from Dad (at least to the best of their knowledge) and still haven't told Luther or Diego. It feels wrong to keep these three mind blowing things a secret from their own siblings but they didn't know what else to do.
Luther would no doubt blab to Dad and Diego would probably be so full of himself since he'd be trusted over Luther he'd unintentionally act suspicious.
Maybe Klaus, Ben, and herself are overreacting and being unfair but they don't know what else to do. There's no handbook for situations like this.
It hurts. Every time Luther stares at the empty chairs at the table, or Diego tries the locked door handles to Ben and Five's rooms, it feels like a betrayal to keep her mouth shut. But she swallows down her pain and continues forward because she's scared of it all backfiring horribly if they change anything else.
All the hiding and secret meetings are making Allison antsy. So far they have come up with zero ideas on how to move forward. Pretty pathetic if you ask her. Five could be alive and they've done jack squat.
She's tired of feeling the weight of the world on her shoulders. She's tired of feeling like Five's life is in her hands, and every day they do nothing feels like a ticking time bomb.
Like Five is a pile of sand and he's slowly slipping through her fingers, blowing away in the wind to never be seen again.
It all came to a head when she was in the living room. She was wiping lingering water from her hands against her itchy skirt after using the bathroom when Ben's statue in the courtyard caught her eye.
Allison moved closer to it, watching as a bird landed on his head. Another bird flies ahead and shits, white droppings landing on Ben's eye. She then turns her gaze to Five's painting over the mantelpiece.
If he's not already dead there's no way she's going to allow him to end up like Ben. Bird poop slowly drying over a statue made after the image of a dead teenager.
She quickly turns on her heel and marches down to their rooms. She's had enough. They're figuring something out today.
Allison hears voices in Viktor's room so she opens the door.
Viktor and Klaus are standing in the middle of the room, Klaus’ hands clutched at his side in fists and glowing blue. He’s sweating and grunting in frustration, and Viktor is speaking to him.
"—on Ben. Focus on how much you want him to appear. Until that's all you want to happen, let the emotion wash over you"
“What’s going on?” she asks.
”Training my powers!” Klaus says breathlessly. He releases the tension in his hands and sits heavily on the bed. “Trying to, at least. Ben said he followed Dad into his office and he was writing notes about all our trainings. I thought that if I could train my powers, maybe I can make him corporeal and he can pick up the book and read it. Maybe there’s something about Five.”
Allison thinks for a moment while Viktor gives Klaus a glass of water. “That's a great idea Klaus. If he is writing notes about Five that means he knows something that’s going on. Ben was the one the afterlife told so there's obviously something his ghost stuff needs to help with.” she turns her gaze to the desk, where she assumes Ben is. “Why don’t you just follow Dad around for a day? See where he goes?”
Klaus pauses, glass raised halfway to his lips. He points to an empty space next to him on the bed. “Ben’s actually right here…but shit Allison that’s a good idea. Why the hell have none of us thought about that?”
She flips her hair off her shoulder dramatically and purses her lips. “Because I’m the only smart one around here!” She gets an amused eyebrow raise from Klaus but not much else since his mind is racing from what she just said. After a moment she drops the act and dons a serious face. “Well this is kind of a crazy situation to begin with so it’s understandable. You said Dad’s book was in his study, right?”
”Bye Ben!” Klaus smiles as his gaze tracks the bed to the door. “He shot up so fast and practically floated through that door like the majestic phantom he is. He’s off to find Dad. But yeah, the book's in his office. Why do you ask?”
”I'm gonna break in there”
Fear flashes across Viktor’s eyes. “Allison, that’s really dangerous. If he catches you…”
She shakes her head. “Five needs us. I can’t let Dad get in our way. I’ll rumor him if I have to” She starts to exit the room but stops. “It's been long enough, we need to actually do something"
"That doesn't mean you have to put yourself in harm’s way like that. Let's just wait until Ben comes back, maybe we can get a better picture of where to start—"
Allison places a hand on his shoulder. "I need to do this, I'm going crazy doing nothing." she takes in a deep breath and stares him in the eyes. "Thanks for training Klaus. I’m glad we’re working together now”
Viktor smiles at her, and she uses it as courage to follow through with her plan.
Step one: Grab the lock picking kit.
"Don't die Alligator, I don't want anyone else but Ben haunting me" Klaus leaves as a departing farewell.
Allison suppresses a snort and crosses over to her room, her hand freezing over where the kit should be.
Where the hell is it? She hasn’t used it in a bit but she’s never moved it. No one else (Klaus) would have grabbed it since they all have their own.
It’s confusing but not suspicious, and she’s determined to break into Dad’s study so she's leaving her room to grab Klaus' kit when something catches her eye.
There’s something on her desk.
She shuffles over to get a better look and picks it up.
“And that is how the two of us will rule. Headquarters will be established out of the way where no one else can find us. No one has abilities like you my child.”
Five smiles at Dad, albeit a little nervously. Existing in a pocket dimension? That is hard, heavy math. He doesn’t know if he can do it. "That definitely guarantees nobody bothers us. How did you even think of that?"
"Ever since I found out you could time travel. This is your destiny. I've always intended upon creating the Commission even before you were born. Even while I was with—" Dad pauses, staring off into the distance. It looks like he's getting choked up, and it's strange to see that on his face. To see an emotion other than the extremes of anger and happiness. He soon looks back down, clamping Five's left upper arm and continues. "I knew that one of you children could help me with your abilities. I'm just so glad that I found you."
Five gulps, his breathing shaky. "That's really difficult math, Dad. I don't know if I can do it"
His father gets closer to him, bending down on his knees so their eyes are level. "I believe in you. My son, you teleported on the very first night I collected all you children. You scared the nanny half to death. Until you controlled your abilities more when you were three or four, you would quickly blink everywhere, dodging the nanny when she'd try to change you or put you in time out. I had to get another nanny, one just for you since the first couldn't handle all of you children at once."
Five flinches back, not quite believing it. "Really?"
Dad smirks. "Really. You were always special, Number Five. That is why I named you what I did."
Oh right. He'd forgotten about that. Five had been so angry when Dad told him. Him and his siblings were so excited the night they were given their names. Mom had picked them out, researching their backgrounds and names from the countries they were born in. Five was from Ireland, names like Cillian, Fionn, Seamus, or Rónán were floating through his head as possibilities, ones that he liked from a book in the library.
Except when he walked into the study, Mom didn't give him a name. Dad did.
"Would you like to go by that name now, Number Five?" Dad says in the present, snapping him from his thoughts.
He doesn't. He really doesn't. But...Dad is showing him love. Dad isn't hurting him anymore. He's given hugs, better meals, and treated with respect. Dad is a monster that Five can't help but love back. The anger he felt when he heard the name before has slipped away, leaving numbness in its place.
"Yes" he says, the word slipping past his mouth like a lie.
This whole idea—The Commission—Five doesn’t quite understand it. Why Dad is so motivated to create it. It’s been nice, working alongside him, feeling important. Feeling supported. Feeling loved.
It made so much sense in the beginning, when he first decided to follow Dad. Fueled by self-hatred (that still exists and grows by the day) and the lack of other options, he did what he did. Hugged and apologized to Dad. He may be questioning it now but he doesn’t regret the apology. Five is a piece of shit that nobody deserves to be stuck with.
But over time, every equation he completes, every smile Dad throws his way, it feels like someone’s tossing a pile of dirt over his grave.
He missed Ben’s funeral and now he’s next.
Five has buried himself. Made his bed and lied in it. And now every decision afterwards is covering him up. The dirt pouring over him, sealing him off from the outside world. From the rest of his family.
He chose Dad over them. Dad, who has hurt them so much, again and again and again. And Five willingly—of his own accord—chose to follow him. He betrayed his siblings once more. Kissed them like Judas, gaining thirty pieces of silver for the price of losing everything else.
There’s a nagging feeling in the back of his mind. That something’s off. Something’s wrong. That his disloyalty only leads down a dark path. That his future is not as hopeful as Dad says it is.
Five feels pulled in two separate directions.
One towards Dad, and one towards his siblings and Mom.
Mom has continued to visit him for meals. She’s kept trying to comfort him, to be a shining light in his life but he shoves her away. He reacts coldly. Doesn’t answer her questions. Sees the hope in her eyes diminish. He can tell that she wants him out of here.
And Five…part of him wants out too. But he’s in this too deep. He’s already crossed the line, working with Dad.
Even if somehow he’s able to find his siblings, they certainly won’t want him. Not after what he’s done. They’ve moved on, anyway.
Luther, Diego, Allison, Klaus, Ben and…Viktor.
A surge of love bursts forth from Five’s chest. He loves Viktor so goddamn much and it kills him that he’s missed this big development in his life. Both his powers and his new self, he hasn't been there for either of them. The two of them were inseparable, Five and Seven. Now, Viktor probably views them a strangers.
He missed four years with the first jump, and he’s missed who knows how long since being down here. It’s probably 2007 by now.
And he’s still in this fucking basement. Hasn’t seen the light of day in months. Fed meals like a child. Shits in a toilet connected to the room that removes his ability to teleport. His favorite sibling will be murdered if he tries to escape.
And yet here he is, directly helping the person that put him here.
His siblings definitely wouldn’t want to see him ever again.
Luther may be on a leash for Dad, his little pet, but Five is the leash. Dad has told him continuously how much he adores him. That he’s the only one out of the siblings Dad actually loves. That he respects. The others are disposable to him.
Five is Dad’s entire world and he both loves and abhors it.
He knows it’s wrong yet he's attached to him anyway. And that has changed the color of his blood. Filled him with poison. He’s nothing but an empty, hollow husk.
Five’s story will not have a happy ending. He doesn’t deserve one.
But his siblings deserve to know. Viktor deserves to know he didn't intentionally abandon them (at least not in the beginning, it feels like he's doing that now).
He needs to fucking tell them somehow. Dad’s been buttered up and trusts him completely—especially since he's going by his original name now—but that doesn’t mean he’s stupid. Five won’t be allowed upstairs.
They work together on the equations some more, Five’s brain literally being scraped raw with the complexity. He scribbles down a few more numbers, and an idea pops into his head.
They’re done for the day and packing up. Instead of leaving the pen on the table, he slips it into his pocket and rests his hand behind his back. Dad is gathering together the papers, and Five blinks one of them at the bottom of the pile to his hand. He quickly shoves it into the back of his shorts.
They walk back, Dad leaving him with an “All my love, son” before cranking the door shut. Five is left staring at his reflection in the two way mirror.
His skin is pale, eyes bloodshot with purple bags underneath, and greasy hair matted to his forehead that’s awkwardly long. It's just shy of not being long enough to tuck behind his ears and the back annoyingly brushes his neck. The short sleeve of his t-shirt lies empty on his right side.
Since he lost the arm, he hasn’t been given the button downs anymore, not being able to fasten them by himself and he refuses to be dressed like a toddler by Mom.
His disability frustrates him. He has bottles of shampoo, conditioner, and soap (also a toothbrush/toothpaste) that lie on the tiny sink next to the toilet, which he uses to cleanse himself.
It was easier before Dad took his arm. Wetting his hair, washing it, and cleaning his pits with the soap was much easier with two hands. Now he only has one and even struggles opening the damn bottles.
Recently he hasn't even mustered up the courage to cleanse himself anymore because of that, and his stringy, greasy hair and body that reeks is reflective of his emotional state.
He can see it in Mom’s eyes when she visits. She can see his spiral into madness. He knows it disgusts her. That all she wants to do is recoil from him, her disappointment of a "son".
He’s not worth saving.
He’s a pathetic excuse of a human being, and doesn’t understand what Dad sees in him. Why the hell he’s so attached to a person who doesn’t even bathe himself properly is beyond him.
His right arm starts hurting again as he stares at his reflection, a burning sensation overtaking him.
He gasps in a breath, sinking to the floor and clutching his right shoulder. There’s nothing there. It was cut clean off yet he can still feel it.
Five is so insane that he can’t even lose a limb properly. His skin is on fire and all he wants to do is massage it and apply pressure but there’s nothing to grab.
The tears come back, and he slinks over to his bed, burying his childishness in his pillow.
Eventually the pain subsides, the tears having dried tracks onto his disgustingly dirty face he hasn’t washed in probably a week.
He’s exhausted, and falls into a stressful sleep. The dream that awaits him is not what he expected.
The memory he’s been chasing has finally been dug up.
"FIVE????”
Allison stands there, bewilderment in her eyes.
His sister. Holy crap his sister is standing there.
Her and Dad exchange a few words that he can't make out. He tries to say her name but slips on the blood that coats the floor.
His blood.
Spilt by Dad.
It’s gushing down his face and leaking from his right arm. His head is getting light, and pain radiates throughout his arm, head, nose, everything, only intensified by his fall.
Allison and Dad are arguing, but he can’t hear them over the pain. It’s clouding all his senses, the only thing he can see.
Red, red, red. Thick blood running out of him, filling up the room.
He’s suddenly being moved around very jerkily. He manages to slit open his eyes, and can see that Allison is attempting to grab him.
Dad is not letting her. He’s dodging every move and damn is it making the black abyss of unconsciousness sound appealing.
He wants nothing more than to give in but he can’t. Allison is right here and he can’t leave her.
A few moments pass, and Dad is holding some sort of knife against his throat. His eyes are open but it’s very blurry and the blood from the gash on his forehead is still blocking his vision so he can’t really see anything. How the hell Dad managed to grab a knife is beyond him.
They start walking, and the pressure of the weapon never releases from his throat.
Suddenly his sensations are overtaken. Something cuts through the pain and overrides his body.
“I heard a rumor you do not give up and discover a way out of here"
Five jolts awake. Sweat covers him, sticking to his skin and making him hot and uncomfortable. A pounding headache pulses in his skull.
Allison.
Allison was here.
She found a way down here. To him.
She cares about him.
She loves him.
The rest of his memory comes back. After the rumor, it was easier to focus. Dad demanded she tell him how she discovered them and she revealed there’s a surveillance room somewhere in the house. It lead her down here.
She then promptly looked into the mirror and rumored herself to forget.
But not before telling Five she loved him.
And he told her that he loved her back. Because that’s his sister.
He loves her more than he could ever love Dad.
Dad has been abusing them. Hurting them. Their entire lives. Dad hurt him so much that his arm had to be amputated. Yet Five still wanted to help him.
Has hugged him multiple times and has helped him create time travelling devices and equations to build a pocket in the universe for them to live and control Time.
He’d believed Dad when he told him he loves him. And Dad does, in a sick, twisted way. And Five is pathetic for playing along with his games.
But Allison…loves him anyway. Allison doesn’t know what level he’s stooped down to since she last saw him. Doesn’t know that he’s betrayed them all. But his gut tells him that the girl he saw trying to physically fight Dad to save him would still love him, even now.
Five doesn’t think he deserves it. How could he? But the fact still remains that Allison, his only sister, would do anything for him. Tear apart the world for him. She loves him. Love that is stronger, and more pure than any love Dad has for him.
He doesn’t think he’s worthy of it.
But he trusts her.
He uncaps the pen in the darkness of the room underneath his blanket (sheltered from view of the camera that probably has nighttime vision) and pulls the crumpled sheet of paper out of his shorts.
His plan from earlier is now being completed. Five realizes that the rumor Allison gave him helped him create it, even though he didn’t remember until just a few minutes ago. It was working this whole time, rising past the swelling artificial devotion to Dad.
He writes a letter addressed to her, and waits.
Morning comes. Five musters up the energy to wash his hair, face, and armpit. He brushes his teeth. It’s difficult and takes awhile, but he has hope now.
It’s a long time before Dad comes, it always is. As much as Dad has made it clear that his priority is their work together, he still has an entire other life and must keep up appearances for his siblings. Allison once knew but she forgot. And now with Five’s plan, she’ll know again.
Mom brings in a meal. Five is still reeling from the realization last night and is so paranoid that his plan won’t work so he doesn’t say anything.
She notices that he actually cleaned himself, he could see the joy in her eyes.
Five shakily eats the scrambled eggs on toast she brought, gulping it down with orange juice she silently held in her hand the entire time.
Just before she gets up to leave, he grabs her hand. He wants to tell her something, anything, but she’s programmed to tell Dad so he keeps his mouth shut.
Instead, he leans forward and hugs her. He wraps his arm around her back and squeezes tightly. Surprised, she hugs him back.
This time it feels good.
He pulls back, and can tell that Mom notices something’s different. He’s not hopeless anymore. She cups his face with her hand.
”You’re starting to get a mustache, my dear sweet boy. My, my, how you’ve grown”
Mom stands up and Five quickly brings his hand to his upper lip to discover that yes, there’s some facial hair there now.
”Good luck” she says under her breath before leaving.
His heart pounds violently in his chest. Maybe Mom isn’t as controlled as he thought. She knows he has something planned and just encouraged it.
He’s left to stew thinking about that particular realization until the door cranks open again, Dad stepping through.
Five plasters a smile on his face. “Good morning, Dad”
"Good morning, Reginald" Dad says.
They walk to Viktor’s cell to test their latest briefcase prototype and on the way, Five finishes his plan.
Out of his own cell, his powers are back.
Instead of teleporting himself, he just blinks an object.
Five can spatial blink objects to any location, as long as he’s seen it before.
He blinks the letter straight onto Allison’s desk.