Chapter Two

Run Boy, Run.

(Part I)

It was uneventful Monday early evening. A pot of stew sat on the stove, which is pretty much what they ate every Monday in November. Her dad would be home soon and then they would sit, eat, and talk about their days. Celeste set the table while her grandma got ahead on the dishes, like always. It was all so routine that Celeste wasn't even thinking about anything, which was nice.

"Five just brought up time travel during dinner!" The voice of her twin rang in her head.

Her brain would not process the words. Surly she imagined that, but her heart pounded in her chest and told her otherwise.

"Lest? Can you hear me? Five is arguing with The Monoc-shit he just blinked across the table!"

"I can hear you." She thought back as calmly as she could.

Five had been bringing up time travel to her for the past few weeks. She had some thoughts and suggestions, but he had an idea in his head and nothing else was going to satisfy him except to blink through decades of time. Talking to The Monocle was the next step and she knew he was going to ask soon, but she never thought he would during a meal! They weren't allowed to talk during meals, which made Celeste sad for many reasons. In this particular situation though, it made her scared.

"What's happening now?" she thought to Klaus. She paid no attention to where she put the utensils and gave her father three knives for his stew.

"They're arguing! During a meal! This is-"

"-About what?"

"Time travel!"

" I know! What are they saying?"

"…Something about acorns."

Klaus was many things, but a good translator was not always one of them.

"Anything else?" Celeste set her grandma's glass where the bowl should be and the bowl where the glass should be.

"Five said he's not afraid and now dad is talking about body and mind effects."

Good. Maybe hearing it from The Monocle would have him think of it differently. And Vanya was there, surly she was trying to get is attention as well. Maybe this wouldn't be so bad.

"He's walking out!"

Clang! Celeste dropped a bowl on the floor and ran out door.

"Lesty?!" Her grandmother called out after her.

"Sorry Oma-be right back!" She dashed down the hallway stairs of their apartment building.

"He stopped! Dad shouted your name and Five turned around!"

Celeste slowed down her run.

"..And?"

"Sorry, it's hard to listen and do this. Dad wants to know what you think…Five says you…to try small time frames first and…you think he should be afraid."

"I-yes-"

"-Now dad says…people go their whole lives looking for a companion who challenges them like that…never find them…he found it at age nine…just now being allowed to explore what this means romantically… does he really want to risk loosing that."

Celeste stood frozen on the stairs.

She wished it mattered what was being said. But all the mattered is what Five would do and he was going to either sit or run. She felt out for him. He felt sure, he felt frustrated, but no concern or consideration.

"What is Five doing?"

"He's saying of course not…but he's sure it's-"

"-What is he doing? Has he moved back towards the table?"

"No."

Celeste flew down the rest of the stairs.

"Dad just forbid him to talk about it any more…"

Celeste got to the first landing.

"…He took off again! Shit, he's not stopping!"

Celeste got to the front entrance.

She slammed open the front door. She turned to to right and saw the back of Five, who was already outside and a few steps away from The Academy. She ran towards him.

"Five!" she cried out as he blinked away.

March 25, 2019. The Midnight Hours.

She had felt him in Vanya's apartment as she entered the building, so she turned right back around and hid behind a tree across the street. Vanya should be back any second anyway.

As he sits and waits in the apartment, she can feel the decades on him. She didn't have time at Griddy's to let them sink in, but there was an old pain on him. It reminded her of Oma, her grandma who grew up in Germany during World War II. It wasn't the exact war torn country trauma, but he had trauma and decades of it. Yet he looks like only a day has past since he left, if that.

Celeste suddenly sobs and has to fight to maintain control of her breath. She aches all over. Everyone's pain she felt this morning lingers on her (or rather yesterday morning, it has to be past midnight now. Goodness she needs to sleep!) And the unfathomable thoughts and feelings of Number Five being back in this way she has yet to fully comprehend. Her body can't hold back the water anymore and she breaks open. It's moments like these she knows she can't judge Klaus for how he chooses to cope. Not that she wants to, but she physically can't. They share this pain, but he confronts it even more. For every person living there are 15 dead. Not all 15 have a lingering ghost, but still. He chooses to dam the water, the pain, up and she has chosen to let it burst through the wall. The burst hurts through, every time.

But the initial burst is always the worst of it, then it grows smaller and smaller over time.

She collects her breath and feels Vanya, through the aches, in the cab that just pulled up. Celeste makes her way across the street.

Vanya. She has a similar sensation to Klaus. Her medication has dammed something up too, but it was not by her choice. She said she had crippling anxiety as a small child and this was the only thing that helped. The words were just repeated words though. They were something her father told her and Celeste did not fully trust Sir Reginald Hargreeves, the only human being she couldn't feel emotions on. He had a wise way about him though, irrational and cold, but she could tell he knew far more and saw beyond what he let on in an almost other worldly way. And Vanya believed him. Celeste was not around to feel what happened before age nine, so she trusted Vanya. But she often wondered what would happen if Vanya just let all that pent up anxiety burst through the dam.

Vanya turns around and sees Celeste cross the street. Celeste sort of was running towards her like a creepy stalker so Vanya has good instincts.

"What happened?!" Vanya asks as she makes her way to meet Celeste. Celeste must still look a mess from the sob session.

"Five is in your apartment."

Vanya's face falls.

"I told him to stay put until I talked to you first! Lest, I'm so sorry. I-"

Celeste shakes her head.

"We ran into each other at Griddy's. It was unintentional. All of it."

"All of it?"

Celeste feels the lingering stings of Five's kills.

"I didn't get any doughnuts. I'm sorry."

"I have left over coffee cake."

"Oh, thank goodness."

"What do you want to do?" Vanya asks.

"Get this over with." They make their way to the building.

Let the water break forth.

Vanya unlocks her door. Number Five sits smug in her chair. Celeste stays in the hallway. Even knowing, it's still kind of shocking to actually see him there.

"Geese, Five." Vanya says as she sets down her keys.

"You should have locks on your windows." he says.

"I live on the second floor."

"Rapists can climb."

Celeste puts her hands over her face. It was such a dumb point. But it was also accurate. Five and his dumb logic.

Celeste enters behind Vanya and Five stands at the site of her.

"You're okay." He declares and asks at the same time.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Celeste stays behind Vanya.

"Okay from what?" asks Vanya.

Five and Celeste exchange a look, but Celeste quickly breaks eye contact.

The air is overloaded with too many things to discuss. Celeste feels a sharp pain from Five. She scans him and sees blood soaking through his sleeve.

"You came here to ask Vanya's help with something, I'll leave you two to it."

"I'll need your help too."

Celeste looks to Vanya. "His arm has been cut open and is bleeding."

She turns and makes her way to Vanya's room and closes the door. She feels Five follow, but Vanya blocks him.

"No. You give her her space." Celeste hears through he door.

V. A true friend.

Celeste sits with her back to the bedroom door and takes it all in.

Vanya mends Five's arm as he tells her he's seen the end of the world and it will end in eight days. It feels horrible, the apocalypse wasteland that he was stuck in. Celeste feels bad for thinking he was enjoying wherever he was so much and that's why he never came back. Turns out it was exact opposite. Vanya is hesitant to believe him. Celeste can't quite believe it either, but she feels that Five is certain of what he's seen and knows and his pain is real.

Vanya had a point though, time travel can mess with your mind and body.

But Five is stubborn, he wants to leave but he stays because Vanya asks. Celeste feels Five consider something as Vanya turns on the shower. She decides she might as well get this conversation over with or started.

Celeste opens the bedroom door as Five opens the front door to leave.

"And just how are you going to lock that door behind you? If rapists can climb, they can certainly open unlocked doors." She declares to him.

Five smiles the same smile he would when Ben would say "check" during a game of chess. He closes the door and locks it back up. He then puts his hands in his pockets and waits.

Her move.

She's not going to go to him, but she is going to go to the kitchen and get coffee cake and that just happens to be in his general direction.

"Do you believe me?" He asks as she gets a plate.

"I believe that you believe what you saw and I don't have a reason for why you would just make that up." She cuts a piece of coffee cake.

"So, that's a no."

She looks at the blood on his collar and on his neck below his ear.

"It's a yes with an asterisk. Vanya had a point. You can't rule out time travel not having an effect on your mind when it clearly has had an effect on your body, Five!"

She slams the plate with a piece of cake on it to the counter. The plate rattles and the cake falls to the floor. She shakes as she picks it up. Five's frustration subsides as he sees her anger grows. For a brief moment Celeste feels out to Vanya relaxing in the shower and tires to let her calmness take over, but instead Celeste is entirely aware of the sound of the water. She hears it, loud for a second, then soft. Celeste cuts a new piece a cake and focus back on Five.

"This was one error-" He starts

"-I missed your explanation to them." She interrupts him. "I can feel decades. Exactly how long as it been for you?

Celeste feels his pain before he says, "Forty-five years."

Celeste can't tell the difference between her ache and his ache on that one.

"And you were in the apocalypse, but when did you join the briefcase people?"

Shock and concern exude from Five. "They found you?"

"Twice."

Five paces. "I wasn't with them that long. What did they want?"

"To know if I'd seen you. You left them?"

"Yes. Just now, they have been jumping through all the time periods looking for me now. So they are finding you in your past now to ask if you'd seen me there because I've been missing since a few hours ago."

He talks as if he casually describing the crest on his jacket. Celeste rubs her head. She hasn't missed this.

"And you miscalculated your jump back to a few hours ago and ended up in the exact body you left in?"

"A version of it, yes. Look, that's who was at Griddy's so there's no time to…"

She stops listening. He's now too old for her mentally and too young for her physically.

"-This is cruel, Five!" She spurts out and silences whatever he was saying.

She doesn't even need to feel it, the look on his face says it all. He knows it. It's torture for him too. Celeste takes a bite of the cake, but she can't taste it.

"I know I have a lot to make up for, a lot more than eight days can hold, which is one of the many reasons why we need to stop the apocalypse!"

"But what if eight days is all you have and you waste it trying to do something you can't?"

"It wont be wasted if we stop it!"

He turns and opens the door again. Didn't they just talk about rapists and unlock doors?

"Leaving. It's still what you do best, I see."

He stays inside and slams the door shut. That one hurt and she meant it to. But, what good is this going to do?

"You said we to Vanya. So you had someone with you during the apocalypse?"

Five doesn't look at her, but he nods his head. Thinking of whoever it was calms him. Celeste can feel a mix of longing and purpose, which she has learned usually means love. This is whole new heartbreaking situation.

"That's a miracle, Five. Another survivor with you in that wasteland. I'm glad you had someone. Really I am." Really she was. She can also feel lost. He lost them. Her, Celeste assumes.

"I'm sorry you lost her."

"I…I left her." His pain strikes her like a flash of lightening so Celeste doesn't comment on the fact that he left something yet again.

"But she's here in this time period too." He says.

"Right." Celeste takes the last bite of cake.

"Did you ever…?" Five puts his hands in his pockets. "If I can ask."

Celeste finishes the cake.

"I thought I did a few times. Yes."

Five nods. "I'm sorry they didn't work out." He is.

Celeste puts her plate in the sink. She's done with this cake and this night. She damps a napkin and hands it to him.

"For your neck" she says as she points to where the blood would be on her behind her ear.

He wipes the blood off his neck and she takes it back and tosses it in the trash can.

There's a heavy silence.

"So kids, what have we learned form this after school special?" Celeste breaks it and points to the unlocked door.

Five laughs. Something that catches them both by surprise. He's not one to laugh easily and she forgot how good it feels to make him.

"Rapists can open unlocked doors." He says without missing a beat and locks the door.

"That right, they absolutely can." She heads back down the hallway into Vanya's room. Five waits until she closes the bedroom door and then he blinks away.

Only a few hours ago Celeste had planned on staying up with Vanya eating doughnuts and hearing all about how The Monocle's funeral went. She had so missed their late night bedside chats. But she laid down on Vanya's bed and fell right through it. She fell through the floor, then through the apartment below. Then through the ground and on into the earth. Either that or she was dreaming. She thought she felt Vanya come in, but she couldn't be sure. She was still falling and wondered if she was ever going to land.

Chapter 2

Run Boy, Run

(Part II)

March 25, 2019. The daylight hours.