AN: I'm glad you guys are enjoying the story! Let me know what you think, and as before, enjoy!

Chapter Five

"Go talk to her." Ben said for the third time.

Klaus had been struggling with the idea ever since she'd run off. He wanted to talk to her, but was a little afraid to do it. After she attacked Diego like she did, he was kind of freaked out, to the point he didn't know if he wanted to be alone with her. On the other hand, the look of abject terror at what she'd done triggered his feelings for her. It made him want to hug her, to comfort her like they did for each other when they were young. It brought back all of those memories of how close they used to be.

But she threw someone across the room. Shouldn't that be enough for him to keep his distance?

It wasn't. Of course it wasn't. Even without Ben's prompting, Klaus found himself heading for the only place he knew Andy went to hide.

Klaus's stomach churned when the elevator came to an abrupt halt. His eyes drifted shut and he fought a groan as he did his best to keep from vomiting all over the lift's floor. When it settled, he exited with Ben at his side.

He had always been uncomfortable in the depths of the manor. The walls were constructed of dull grey concrete with industrial-styled lighting. It looked like every sinister bunker in every horror movie, ever. And it sent a chill down his spine, but he pressed on.

At the end of the long hall sat a large round room, innocuous and simple, but it was what was within the room that held his attention. A water tank with comical dimensions rested in the center. The round structure had a circumference of nearly fifteen feet. Klaus didn't even know how many hundreds of gallons it held.

The closer he drew, the clearer she became. Through the inches-thick pane of glass that separated the interior of the tank from the outside world, Klaus could see Andy. She sat at the bottom with her knees drawn to her chest and her face buried within them. Her long, dark hair swayed softly around her head, her shirt fluttered, and if it weren't for the dull hum of the tank's filtration in the background, it would have been a haunting thing to see.

It did still cause him to pause, however. No matter how many times Klaus had seen her in her water tank, he was never entirely prepared for it at first. When they were younger and she would spend days in the water, it wasn't uncommon for her to be tied to a hook at the bottom. The rope would be looped around her ankles to keep her in place. Seeing her suspended that way, with her hair fluttering along with her clothing always made her look a little too ethereal and ghostly. It unnerved him back then.

Klaus's thick brows tugged together as he looked in at her.

When he reached the tank, Klaus raised his hand to knock, but he hesitated. For the briefest of moments, he didn't want to disturb her. But he knocked, eventually, anyway.

Andy started. Her head shot up at the sound of the dull thud. For a moment, she was clearly frightened by the sudden sound, until she spotted the cause. Klaus set his open hand on the glass.

"You okay?" He asked. He knew she could hear him, she just couldn't speak. While she –somehow- managed the ability of breathing under water, it didn't translate to conversation.

She didn't reply and instead rested her cheek on her knee, looking away from him when she did.

"Come on," He let the words trail in an almost whining way. "At least surface or something."

For a moment, Andy didn't move. She seemed to think over his request and when she finally reacted, it wasn't how he suspected. Instead of resurfacing, Andorra stood and simply walked to the distant wall to sit once more. There it was again, another unsettling demonstration of her ability. She should have floated and flailed like a normal person, but no. Why would she? She had control over her element.

Klaus grumbled to himself. He stepped away from the tank's window and moved to the right. He jogged effortlessly up the steps that led to the open top. With a quick flick, he turned on the lights. They sprang to life, their fluorescent glow sputtering and illuminating the interior of the tank. Klaus could see her clearly from the surface, despite the one light that refused to turn on.

She looked up at him with slight annoyance, but it had the desired effect. Andy soon rose to the surface.

"Hey," He said with a crooked smile. "Have a nice swim?"

"What do you want?" she asked in a meek voice. Klaus could tell she was still rattled about what had happened upstairs.

Klaus sat, crossing his legs and leaning forward to prop his elbows on his knees. He interlocked his fingers and lazily rested his chin on them. As he thought about how to proceed with the conversation, he noticed something tied to her wrist. For the first time since she'd arrived in the house, Andy wasn't wearing a long sleeved shirt or jacket. As a result, he was more than able to see the obvious cat collar fastened to it.

"Oh," He chimed in an excited tone, relieved to have something to Segway into. "Where's the kitty?"

Andorra's face twisted and her head dropped. She pressed her forehead against the edge of the tank. A cold lump formed in his gut.

For a moment or two, she seemed to compose herself before she lifted her head again. Andy cleared her throat and did her best to appear in control, but Klaus knew her too well. He could see something was clearly wrong.

"She died." She mumbled under her breath. That horrible feeling in his gut grew even worse than before, to the point he grimaced.

"Sorry,"

Andy shook her head. "It's fine," He knew it was a lie. "She's been sick for a while, but… Jesus, I just didn't want her to die in this house." He heard her voice hitch, but she pressed on. "I did everything I could to keep her out of this house, and she died here, anyway."

Klaus's brows pulled together. "What?"

Andy swallowed the lump in her throat. She ran her hand over her face to wipe away a bit of water, and seemed to fight with the desire to rehash whatever was coursing through her mind.

"She's why I left."

A sudden wash of emotions flooded him at such a simple phrase. Jealousy, anger, and that familiar betrayal all swirled within Klaus when Andy admitted something she'd never told him before.

"Ex-squeeze-me?" Klaus somehow managed to say.

Andy ran her bottom lip between her teeth as she, again, struggled to speak whatever was on her mind.

Instead of remaining in the tank to explain, Andy pulled herself effortlessly out and took a seat on the platform beside Klaus. She let her feet dangle in the water and chose to stare out at the room without glancing to the man at her side.

"I was supposed to kill her." Andy finally said.

Klaus had been struck silent. Andorra was a kind person, and even though he knew his dad could be terrible, he couldn't believe that he'd ask her to openly kill an animal. Thankfully, or not, before he could ask her to explain, she did.

"He had me start on plants." She said. "Water's in everything: the air, people, plants… animals. The Old Man had me try to make houseplants move, and bend, and all kinds of stuff. When I could, he started having me draw the water out, to take every single drop from the plant, to kill it, basically." Her brows furrowed and her head dipped. "After plants, he made me work on cadavers, on trying to make dead animals move again. It went like that for a few months. And then he made me practice on living creatures." Klaus grimaced again. "I had to control bugs, then mice, then guinea pigs… rabbits…" He saw a pained expression take her face. "I tortured those poor animals." Tears began to trickle down her cheeks. "And he'd push and push and push. He told me we'd keep going until I could control people, too. I just couldn't take it anymore."

Klaus noticed she'd begun to caress her arm. He doubted she was even aware she was doing it, but it brought back a painful memory. As her hand glided up and down the length of the massive pink scars that littered her left arm, he remembered when she appeared to him in rehab. Whatever she had to do to those animals had been what drove her to take her life. If Vanya hadn't found her, it would have been permanent.

Andy took a deep breath and let her head fall back. She stared at the ceiling and tried to keep the tears in, but Klaus saw them regardless.

"When I woke up in my tank," She continued with the story, completely neglecting her suicide. "He told me we would start again. About a week later when he let me out, he took me to the training room. There was a box on the table and inside was Cleo. She couldn't have been eight weeks old, just a tiny little thing. I couldn't do it." Andy finally looked at Klaus and he saw how broken she was. "I couldn't hurt that little kitten. I'd already done so many horrible things, I just couldn't. So I took her, and I ran. I packed up everything and left." Even though she'd been weeping throughout the conversation, Andorra finally let the floodgates open and began to genuinely cry, if not outright bawl. "I'm sorry I left you here. I didn't mean to."

Klaus had been consumed with the urge to console her, and did. He reached over and pulled Andy into a hug. She clung to him and continued to cry. He finally had his answers, and honestly didn't feel better for it. Before he knew the reason why she left, he'd been content to be angry thinking she just walked away. It hurt that she disappeared while he was in rehab and less than a month after Ben died, but knowing the reason behind it made him understand. He didn't want to understand. He wanted to be mad because understanding made him realize how petty he'd been over the last decade.

The pair remained that way for a while, until Andy was simply resting her head on his shoulder, and Klaus rested his head on hers. They even held one another's hands, and for those few minutes, it felt like it used to. Klaus was glad for it. It'd been a long time since he'd been able to just sit with someone he didn't have to do anything with. Even in front of his own siblings, Klaus felt an overwhelming need to be on stage, to talk, to act, to do something, but not with Andy. Not with Ben, either. He was just allowed to be.

They stayed that way until Andy drew back. She looked up at him with those big, sad eyes that broke his heart. Klaus loved her. She was his best friend growing up and he felt guilty as hell that he hadn't let her explain anything about why she'd left. He just let his hurt pride take over.

"I'm leaving tomorrow." She told him.

Klaus felt a stab in his chest. He pulled a little further away than before, as though the added space would help at all.

"Sure," He nodded.

"Wanna grab some food or something before I do?"

He forced a smile and a tone that made him sound much more carefree than he felt. "You know me. Always love some free food." She smiled heavily at him. "Just, uh," Klaus hesitated. There was one thing he wanted to say, to make sure they settled on beforehand. "Just don't leave without saying goodbye, okay?"

"Never again." She said with a small nod.

Klaus left her shortly after. He asked if she wanted to join him, but she politely refused. He wasn't entirely surprised she wanted to spend more time in the tank. Surrounded by water was the only way she felt safe and comfortable.

The following morning, Andy emerged from the second floor in shock as to what she saw. There were bullet holes in the walls, chunks taken from the doorframes, and the chandelier in the entryway foyer was on the ground with broken glass littering the space. The night before, Andy had been so tired she didn't notice anything, despite the fact she walked right by it all.

"Where the hell were you?"

Andy spun and looked up to see Diego staring angrily down at her from the second floor landing.

"What happened?"

"We were attacked." He said as he began to jog down to the first level. "Where the hell were you?"

"In my tank. Is everyone okay?"

He scoffed and shook his head when he finally made it to her. Andy arched a brow. She knew what he meant by the derisive sound. She'd grown accustomed to hearing it from him.

"This house is shot up by psychos, and you're taking a dip. Seriously?"

"Oh, no." She openly glowered at him. "I don't think so. You see," She turned to give him her full attention. "You don't get to stand there and chastise me for not helping when you've spent the last, almost twenty years, happily telling me I don't belong, that you're better off without me, and you don't need me here. Can't push me away, then expect me to help, too." Andy headed for the stairs and made her way toward the kitchen to eat. "That's not how this shit works."

As she jogged down the aged steps with familiar ease, Andy knew she was full of shit. If she'd been aware of what was happening last night, she would have fought. She would have done anything she had to to protect the few people she cared about within the house. It was simply how she was.

But, that didn't mean she wouldn't turn around and snap at Diego when he attempted to guilt her.

After breakfast, Andy have every intention of going around the house and saying farewell to the people she liked, and the ones she hadn't been able to say goodbye to when she left the first time. She felt like she owed Pogo, Grace, Klaus and Vanya.

The trouble was, she had no idea what had happened the night before, and that half of her list was gone.