Death was nothing like Ben could have ever expected.
What had he expected?
He didn't know, not really, but becoming a ghost of all things? Nothing could have ever prepared him for that.
Stuck in the world of the living and unable to move on to the afterlife, unsurprisingly the first few years had been tremendously hard. Ben had spent most of his time wallowing in despair, wondering what he could have possibly done to deserve such a fate.
He'd watched his family mourn, his siblings consumed by grief. Even Reginald had shown a glimpse of sorrow, in his own unique sort of way.
As a father figure he was unconventional to say the least.
Despite the absurdity of it all, the training, the discipline and the incessant vision to raise them as superheroes, he did care.
Ben had seen it.
Sometimes he had lurked in his fathers study for lack of anything better to do, watching him document all of his research in those enormous leather bound journals. He'd tried to read over his shoulder once in a while but the words had been lost to him.
Most evenings when the children would come to say goodnight there he had remained, head stubbornly buried in his books without rewarding them a single glance. It was an unpleasant ritual that they did most nights without fail, as though one day they had expected some kind of different response.
Grace would usher them away to bed with a soft smile cast on her face, a beam of sunshine amidst the gloom that they felt from their guardians blatant dismissal.
Only when the children had left would Reginald take a moment to pause from his writing, glancing up at the empty doorway with an unreadable expression on his face.
Ben had witnessed that same unrecognisable glance at his own funeral.
As time passed they started to move on and he watched as his siblings grew older, one by one as they left the academy until only Luther remained. They were all living their own lives, trying to break free from the future that Reginald had intended for them- without him.
After so long separated it was strange to see them all together again. So much had changed yet it almost seemed like they hadn't spent a single day apart. Ben watched on in amusement as Luther tried to negotiate another car wreck family meeting, no doubt it was all about Five and his latest obsession with the apparent oncoming apocalypse.
Diego was in his usual spot closest to the nearest exit, a knife in hand as he looked ready to gut his brother on the spot.
"Could you put that away for just just five minutes?" Luther asked, eyeing the familiar blade that had cut him in their earlier fight in the courtyard. Just looking at it was enough to make his arm throb in memory.
"Why don't you come over here and make me?"
There was a familiar flash of blue as Five appeared, looking considerably more dishevelled and bloodied than the last time Ben had seen him.
"Is that a bullet hole?" Allison asked, staring at a suspicious hole in his sleeve.
"It's nothing," he said, disappearing again and re-emerging by the bar to pour himself a drink.
"It doesn't look like nothing to me," she replied. "Why don't you let Mom take a look-"
"We dont have time," he insisted, and proceeded to down his drink.
Five placed the empty glass back on the counter and grimaced, taking a glance at the label on the amber bottle. Despite his distaste, he still took the remaining contents with him.
"Luther told us about what you saw," Allison said, "how we... died trying to stop the apocalypse." She couldn't help but notice how her little brother almost seemed to freeze when he raised the mouth of the bottle to his lips.
"Then you should know that we don't have time to sit around having more family meetings," he said. "The world ends in three days and this time we might be able to stop it."
"I think you've had enough," Diego said, ignoring the scowl Five shot him. "You won't be stopping anything if you're as drunk as a skunk."
"Speaking of drunk," Luther said, "has anyone seen Klaus?"
"Probably sleeping," Diego replied.
"Not for much longer," Five said, but Diego interjected before he could disappear to go and find him.
"Let him sleep a bit longer," he said, "he's trying to sober up."
"He'll get to sleep permanently if we don't stop the apocalypse!"
"What makes you think we'll be able to stop it this time?" Alison asked.
"Harold Jenkins," Five said, draining the remaining contents of the bottle.
"Who is Harold Jenkins?" Luther asked.
"I intercepted a message meant for Hazel and Cha Cha. They were ordered to protect a man called Harold Jenkins. He's the key to all of this-"
"Hazel and Cha Cha?" Allison asked.
"The two freaks that shot up the house," Diego replied. Glancing at the bullet holes embedded in Fives portrait, he couldn't help but notice when the frame started to shake.
The ground began to tremor like the beginning of an earthquake, the portraits shaking on the walls and the glass cabinets rattling with each quake. There was a loud smash as several glasses fell from the bar and Diego jumped from his seat, reaching for a knife instinctively.
"I thought you said we have three more days," Luther said to Five sceptically.
"This isn't the apocalypse," Five insisted, "it cant be. It's too early."
"Well this sure feels apocalyptic to me!"
"No, this is different. In the apocalypse everything had been burned to ash. The mansion was still smoking when I got there," Five insisted, feeling the ground rumbling beneath his feet. "Look outside," he said, approaching the broad window.
"I don't see anything out the ordinary," Luther said, seemingly unconvinced.
"Did the space radiation damage your brain?"
Five always seemed to pride himself on being the smartest person in the room. He wasn't trying to be deliberately aggravating- most of the time anyway. He couldn't help the fact that he was correct about most things, including the current phenomenon the academy was experiencing.
"What ever this is, its only affecting the mansion."
Luther looked vexed with him as usual, but didn't comment. Instead he did as he was asked and gazed out at the window with a sigh.
Five was right.
The outside world remained unaffected by the strange phenomenon.
Ben left his other siblings to go and check on Klaus, mainly to ensure that this time whatever happened, he would at least be wearing more than just a towel this time. He always picked the worst moments to take a bath.
It wasn't unusual to find the Seance submerging himself beneath the water, his long legs peaking out through the thick foam of bubbles.
Nothing could have prepared Ben for the sight of Klaus convulsing in the water.
"Klaus!"
He would never forget the despair he felt at that precise moment, forced to watch his brother drown and being unable to help him.
Intervention was useless but that didn't stop him from trying.
Klaus's fists began to glow a familiar haze of blue, and Ben tried to grasp hold of his brothers limbs as they flailed uncontrollably.
'I need help,' he thought, on the verge of hysteria. 'I need help but no one can see me!'
Suddenly the lounge was engulfed in a haze.
Like bad television reception dozens of bodies flickered in and out of existence. The room was suffocated with the wailing voices, pleading, screaming and yelling all around them as all the spirits tried to compete with each other for attention.
"Halloweens early this year," Five commented wryly.
Diego unsheathed a knife, as futile as it was. He watched as the tip of his blade went right through the disembowelled man in front of him, the steel appearing out of the other side of his head with apparently no effect.
'No one ever found me-'
'Someone needs to stop him before he kills again-'
"Get behind me," Luther commanded to Allison, but she showed no signs of hearing him. All she could hear were the voices in her ears.
'Help me!'
'He ran me over and left me to die!'
'They shot up the house, shot me, and they didn't even take anything-'
'Listen to me!'
Diego jumped out of his skin at the hand that grasped hold of his shoulder, hard.
When he looked up at the face to see just who it belonged to, he stuttered in disbelief.
When Diego looked right into his eyes, Ben could have sworn he felt his heart skip a beat, or whatever the ghostly equivalent was.
"You can see me?!"
"B-B-Ben?!"
"Its Klaus-" His words were distorted as he began to flicker in and out of their perception, as Klaus's powers surged and dwindled uncontrollably.
He looked to his siblings in desperation. "He's-"
Then then he was gone.
The shaking subsided and the mansion seemed to still, a haunting silence falling over them as the rowdy spirits abruptly disappeared.
The siblings had little time to comprehend the absurdity which they had just witnessed.
Time seemed to still for a second as they stared at the now empty spot- where Ben, their dead sibling had stood just moments ago.
"We can mourn later," Five said quickly as he opened up a portal, "find Klaus."
In the end, it was Diego who found him.
Nothing could have prepared him for what he saw.
The door had been left wide open, which wasn't uncommon for Klaus. At first glance the bathroom appeared to be empty.
If it hadn't been for the water spilling over the edge and puddling across the floor, he probably wouldn't have even stopped to check in there at all.
His body lay beneath the water, motionless and cold.
As Diego hauled him out of the water and called desperately for Grace, Ben who was watching from the doorway already knew that it was too late.
Klaus was gone.