It was quiet, far too quiet for the Hargreeves family. Stuck inside, and having grown bored of sitting in their individual rooms doing nothing, they all seemed to decide to do nothing together.
So far no one had tried to start a fight.
Each of the siblings were lounging or sitting in their respective seats when Klaus, face half buried into the back of a couch, mumbled something, catching the attention of his six siblings.
"What?" Both Diego and Ben asked, unbeknownst to the knifiest sibling.
"Truth or dare?" Klaus repeated, moving his face just enough to be heard but otherwise unmoving.
No one said anything, everyone looking at each other as if trying to get the other to answer first.
The silent battle of wills ended with Luther shuffling in his seat a bit, a look of mild confusion on his face.
"Uhm… truth?" He said after a moment.
Allison raised an eyebrow, a small smirk resting on her face. Her eyes went from Luther, who still looked concerned, as if knowing he had made a mistake, to Klaus who remained curled into the couch.
"Huh, ok. If you met a clone of yourself, would you have sex with it?" Klaus asked still not facing anyone, but amusement evident in his voice.
There were three distinct snorts of amusement, and two sets of confused 'what?s'. Ben rolled his eyes as if he expected the question.
"N-no, why, would you?!"
"Absolutely. It would be fantastic." Klaus said airily, still muffled by the couch cushion.
After that brief interruption, silence continued. Just as Vanya and Five had silently agreed to fuck off elsewhere, maybe take a nap, Luther spoke.
"Diego, truth or dare?"
Diego's eyes narrowed slightly, though he'd been working on being less defensive, he wasn't completely perfect.
"Dare."
"I dare you to take your knife vest off and leave it in your room for the rest of the day." Luther said without hesitation. Allison let out a surprised laugh, and Klaus finally turned his face around to glance at Diego to catch a glimpse at his face.
It was the most glorious combination of fury and hopeless confusion he had ever seen.
Diego's mouth opened and closed very much like a fish. "What if we're attacked?!"
"Then you can go get it." Luther said easily, trying to hide his grin.
"No one is going to attack us, anyway." Five said, smirking. "We took care of that, remember?"
"Fine, fine! But if you idiots end up dead it's your fault." Diego said. He stood up abruptly, and seemed to struggle for a moment as he tried to take the harness off.
"You ok, there?" Vanya asked, raising an eyebrow as Diego struggled for a full minute before managing to get it off.
"Fine! Perfectly fine!" Diego stomped upstairs, cursing under his breath the entire time.
"He definitely never takes that thing off." Allison said, giggling. She did her best to hide her face as Diego came back, but he seemed to hone in on her horrible attempts.
"Alright, truth or dare then, if you think it's so funny!"
Allison was taken aback for a moment, but regained her composure quickly. "Tr- no dare!"
By now Klaus had turned his body to face the middle of the room, legs resting in Ben's lap.
"Alright, I'll be right back." Diego was grinning as he left to go to parts unknown.
"I think you should be scared, sis." Vanya said, eyes tracking the path Diego had taken.
"What could he possibly do to me?"
Allison was very confident until she was presented with a muddy, sludgey, questionably liquid filled glass.
"You're making her drink one of your weird health smoothies?" Klaus asked, furrowing his eyebrows.
"What? No, it's just, it's like a bunch of random foods and drinks blended together."
Klaus side-eyed Ben, who merely snorted.
Allison scrunched her nose at the horrible smell wafting from the glass. She took the glass carefully, the strange sludge seeming to bubble just a bit. "I have to drink all of it?" She asked, frowning.
"Yep."
She took a deep breath, steadying herself, and took a small sip. A look of surprise crossed her face, and she tentatively took another sip. "Huh, actually it isn't that bad." She said, continuing to sip her drink.
Diego frowned, watching her a moment before snatching the glass. "Really?" He said, taking the glass and taking a large gulp.
In moments he was retching, "What the Hell kind of broken taste buds do you have?" Diego nearly screamed as he continued to dry heave.
Klaus was half on the floor cackling, Vanya doubled nearly in half, and Luther letting out laughter loud enough to echo against the walls.
"No, it's shit. Nearly puked." Allison admitted, wiping tears from her eyes.
"Fuck you!" Diego said, pointing at her "And fuck you guys!" He said, though there was no heat behind it.
After everyone caught their breaths from laughing Allison spoke up again.
"Ok, Vanya, truth or dare?"
"Oh, uh, truth, n- no yeah, truth." She said firmly, giving a sharp nod.
"Ok, ok. Oh! What did you used to write in those notes you took for dad about us?" Allison asked, knowing the answer herself, already.
Vanya groaned, closing her eyes and falling back into the couch. "This is stupid."
"Wait, you weren't taking actual notes on us?" Luther asked, dumbfounded?
"No, I did! But uh… G-d, I never should have said anything… ok, so… I maybe sometimes used to try and figure out why dad was always so… dad? And I had some conspiracy theories… and thought he might have been an alien." Vanya said, her voice growing smaller and more embarrassed with each word. "And I may have made diagrams… and charts."
Five's eyes widened slightly, and there was a stunned silence around the room.
"I mean you weren't completely off the mark." Klaus said.
"Vanya…"
Another groan. "And I maybe sometimes doodled pictures if him as a teeny alien in a human suit."
"They're really cute." Allison assured her.
"They're awful, he looked like a potato most of the time."
"You still have them?!" Ben asked, a grin stretching across his face.
"No, no you can't see them, I refuse! It's not even a dare turn! Speaking of which, Ben, truth or dare?"
"Boo!" Klaus called out through cupped hands, now sitting cross-legged on the couch, elbows on his knees.
Ben tapped his chin, tilting his head slightly he shrugged "Truth?"
Vanya glanced at Klaus, then back to Ben. "What's the weirdest thing you've ever seen Klaus do since you've been following him around?"
Klaus let out a mildly deranged giggle, as Ben furrowed his eyebrows. "Do you mean weird by Klaus standards, or weird by normal standards?"
"Does it make a difference?" Vanya asked, frowning slightly.
"Yes." The even numbered brothers all said in unison.
"Both, then."
"Ok, so there's the time he tried to wax himself with chocolate pudding." Both Luther and Five groan at this. "And then there's the time he spent a week acting like a British palm tree."
"Not the rhino thing, huh?"
"Well, I think given the opportunity anyone would have tried to ride one. That dude definitely didn't appreciate the comparison, though. "
"He was so mad. But how does he think I felt? Didn't even have the snoot horn."
Vanya stared at them with abject horror on her face.
"So, Five… truth or dare?" Ben asked, after a moment of back and forth with Klaus.
Five glanced up, Klaus muttering something about "Her" not being willing to help, as he resigned himself to his fate.
"Truth."
Ben gave him a smirk, and Five's eyebrows shot up as he realized his mistake.
"What really happened to Luther's space and aeronautics encyclopedia."
Klaus stilled entirely, glancing at Five in pure terror as the second smallest sibling, shook his head minutely.
"Yeah, you know what? Good question! I remember having to beat Luther up for accusing me of stealing it." Diego said.
"I'm pretty sure he knocked you out before you even threw the first punch." Ben muttered.
"Hey! Listen-"
"Come on, Five, answer the question." Vanya said, biting her lip trying to hold back her own laughter.
"-intend to beat him senseless. Why would I want-"
"W… why not ask Klaus, he took it!"
"-do I look like I'm interested in such a-"
Klaus had managed to climb over the couch while Diego continued to rant. He was half crouched behind it, as if he were trying to sneak away, but stopped to stare at Five in utter shock and betrayal."
"-and just because I was covered in ink doesn't mean… What, Klaus? You said you didn't steal it! I had to wr-"
"Oh, just shut up." Ben said with an exasperated eye roll.
"Ok! So Klaus stole the book because I told him I could make a rocket with paper-"
"You just breathed into a straw!" Klaus accused, standing up and pointing at Five. "So, so what if I stole the book, it's still your fault it caught fire!"
"You guys burned my book?" Luther asked, his voice small, mouth in a pout.
"Accidentally! And, and, it wasn't even me!"
"You're the one who wanted to see an explosion, Number Four."
"You didn't have to listen to me!"
"I was doing it for the scientifi-"
"You did it because you wanted to make something go boom, just like I did! It's not my fault I didn't want to use alka-seltzer or whatever!"
"That was my first gift from a fan…"
"It's literally your fault, you said you wanted fire. It's definitely not my fault."
"I told you I didn't steal it, bro!"
"It's your fault for listening to me. The one time someone listens to me, and you catch a book on fire."
"I only read the first chapter."
"But it is your fault that the bench got burned."
The fight continued long enough for Dave to come back from work to see the entire Hargreeves clan shouting at each other, with Luther getting noogied by Diego, Vanya and Ben talking very fast to each other, hands moving in all directions. Allison, Five, and Klaus with shouting over each other, wearing different bits of each other's clothing, with Five declaring that he was, in fact, getting taller.
Dave sighs, watching the scene in front of him before turning around to help Grace in the kitchen.
A/N: It's been over a decade since I've written fanfiction, over two years since I've done any writing, but I'm bored, and mostly out of work so here we are. Enjoy, don't enjoy. I don't even know if this makes sense.
Also Dave and Ben may be alive, I don't know. Dave has a job, I like to think he somehow became an accountant, maybe, I don't know. Also there's no apocalypse. Or there is one and they're all dead. Or they're all alive. Purgatory? In a giant bowl of spaghetti? Sure.