3:41pm, Tuesday June 11th, 2019
"I don't- I don't think I'm up for that," Klaus says earnestly after Five finishes explaining the plan to him. "It's just, I-I don't think I can-" but Five talks too fast for him. Five has always talked too fast for any of them.
"Of course you can," he interrupts, giving him a smile that's probably supposed to be encouraging but instead just looks sort of murdery. "When you think about it, you already have."
"Yeah but...what if I fuck it up? I mean, this is a really big responsibility and we all know I am definitely not the responsible type, right? I- I can't even keep a Tamagotchi alive-" he stops, looking around for help but there's none to be had. Not even Ben, that asshole, abandoning him in his hour of need.
Five reaches out and grabs him by the shoulders, which actually kind of hurts. "Klaus, listen to me. It has to be you, okay? You're the only one who can do this. And if you don't-" he stops, the sentence hanging between them like a noose and Klaus, of course, sticks his neck through it.
"If I don't you'll die," he finishes with a resigned sigh, knowing he's right.
"No," Five corrects. "If you don't the Prime dies. I'll never have existed, you'll be stuck in an alternate timeline with no way to get back and we'll probably cause a paradox that will threaten to tear a hole in the universe, so no pressure, okay?"
Klaus gives a half-laugh that would probably sound a bit hysterical if he put more energy into it.
Five catches his eyes, holds them with his own. This time the knife blade of his smile is blunted into something softer, less cutting. Something that almost looks like an actual smile. "You want to save your brother, this is the only way. The timeline has to be preserved." He gives him a pat on the shoulder that reminds Klaus just how strong this version of Five is- just one more way the Commission had fucked with him.
Klaus nods, squares up, and admits that a big part of his hesitation is just a reluctance to return to this particular point in history- this day. He'd fully intended to leave it in the past, buried like an old bone. But of course, nothing's really in the past when you hang around with a time traveler. He trudges down the hallway, takes a deep breath and knocks on the door.
Nothing. Silence. Just like so many other days...he glances over at Five, who motions for him to try again. He does. "Yoo-hoo" he calls, keeping his eyes on his brother and hoping his voice doesn't sound as false and shaky as it seems to be.
He doesn't want to be here again.
The door opens and Five stares at him, an all-to-familiar confusion in his eyes making him look even younger than 13. "Klaus? What are you doing here?"
Buddy if only you knew. He's gripped with a sudden desire to tell his brother everything, everything that had happened and was going to happen and might never happen. He wants to warn him about the Comission and clones, wants to yell at him to run why he still has the chance-
the chance to do what? This Five is in grips of mental collapse. This Five can't do anything, and he knows it.
This Five is getting ready to blow his own head off.
He swallows and doesn't say any of that. Instead he leans forward conspiratorially and whispers, "I need to show you something."
Five blinks at him and Klaus isn't entirely sure his brother even remembers who he is right now. "No, I'm busy."
"Come on," Klaus whines the way he's supposed to and he has to get Five out of his room and into the hallway so he winds a hand around his brother's arm and pulls him forward.
It shouldn't be so easy to manhandle him but it is, Five stumbling out into the hall with almost no resistance. "What-" he says, the stops, eyes going vacant as the fog around his brain rolls in. Klaus has seen it often enough to know what he's looking at, now.
He wonders why he hadn't noticed sooner. Why someone hadn't noticed sooner. It was so fucking obvious...
"What are you wearing?" Five asks him finally, sounding both offended and bewildered. There's a small flash from inside the bedroom as the other Five materializes by the bed and reaches under the pillow, pulling out a gun.
Klaus realizes he's staring and shifts his attention back to the brother in front of him, and it's a testament to how completely scrambled Five's brain really is that he doesn't even notice the preoccupation, still staring at Klaus' shirt like it had insulted their mother.
Five really doesn't know him that well any more... "Oh, do you like it?" Klaus asks, holding up one corner and trying to keep his voice natural.
"No," Five says irritably and behind them the clone has finished emptying the gun, sliding the now useless piece of metal back under the pillow and pocketing the bullets. He meets Klaus' eyes with a nod, gives a small one fingered salute and blinks away. Party over, time to go. Klaus looks at Five and wants to hug him. Wants to tell him he loves him. Wants to apologize for being so goddamn clueless, for making Five think suicide was the only way.
But he can't do any of those things, the words locked painfully behind his lips. He knows what he's supposed to do, and supposed to say.
"Are you feeling okay?"
"No," Five says again. Then he jerks his arm free and marches back into his room, slamming the door shut between them. The lock clicks. Time moves forward.
He lets out a shaky breath and leans against the wall for a moment, rubbing at his face.
He really hates time travel.
Back in his room the Other Five is already waiting for him, fiddling with the combination lock on the briefcase.
"Where did you even get that?" he asks, pointing at the briefcase cause he's just done his brother a solid so Five owes him an answer or ten, and it's a safer topic than a lot of things Klaus wants to ask about.
"From another assassin," Five says absently as he finishes adjusting the numbers. "We reprogrammed it so the Commission can't track it."
"Right, right..." Klaus says slowly, imagining all kinds of things and none of them even remotely pleasant. "I don't wanna know the details, do I?"
His sort-of brother stands with a shrug, brushing off his jacket. "Probably not."
Fair enough. "Cool...so what now?" he asks, and Five doesn't bother to look at him before reaching out and grabbing him by the collar.
"Now we jump again," he says. And they do.
It's something Klaus has never been able to figure out: his brother can manipulate time in either direction, so why is he always in such a damn hurry?
"Whoa," Klaus says as he's dumped out of the wormhole and onto concrete, blessedly on his feet and without his brain feeling like it's been sucked out of his ear sideways. He doesn't want to criticize the old man, but traveling via briefcase is infinitely more gentle than his brother's own harsh method.
"Hey Klaus," says a familiar voice and Klaus starts, wondering how he could have missed the hulking tower of Luther beside him.
"Oh - hey big guy..." his voice trails off as he looks around, sees the others. "How long have you guys been waiting?"
"We all just got here," Vanya says.
"Oh, lovely. And where is here, exactly?" They're outside somewhere, that's about all he knows, a biting wind tearing through his hair and slipping cold fingers underneath his coat.
Vanya motions with her chin and he obediently turns around, finds himself facing a very large pair of heavy metal doors, set into a very large concrete wall, that is itself embedded into a very large hill of dirt. A symbol he sort of recognizes is carved into the thick metal and his brain searches for the connection. A hazy childhood memory surfaces, something about missile technology and defense grids and he blinks. "Hey, is this place a-"
"Missile silo," Five interrupts, "yeah." Then he blinks away. They all share a slightly puzzled look, and a moment later the massive silo doors open, their brother standing on the other side. "Come on," he says. "The time lock is gonna re-engage in a few seconds. Let's move it."
Klaus doesn't know what a time lock is or what's going to happen when it re-engages but knowing his brother it's probably something nasty that he doesn't want to experience or bear witness to so he falls in step with the others and gets the hell inside. The doors close with an ominous and hollow sounding thud, noise echoing around a vast space and Klaus is looking at the smoothly rounded metal and concrete walls of a very long hallway.
"Come on," Five calls from up ahead. They all give each other a shrug before following.
"Your safe house is a decommissioned missile silo?" Diego asks as he catches up with their brother, sounding both incredulous and a little bit impressed.
"Who said it was decommissioned?" Five asks, and it's a wee bit troubling that Klaus can't tell if he's joking or not. "It's defensible, there's only one way in or out, built to withstand a nuclear blast and Commission briefcases can't get through the time lock unless they have the exact temporal coordinates down to the millisecond- which they don't."
"Why do you need a place that can withstand a nuclear blast?" Luther asks suspiciously. "You uh- I mean- there isn't going to be another apocalypse, is there?"
Five doesn't answer him, which is disconcerting to say the least. "This way," he says instead, "I'll introduce you to the twins."
"Oh, The Twins!" Klaus says, giving a happy little clap of faux anticipation because he's nervous and being nervous always makes him act like a bit of an asshole. They walk for a really long time through a labyrinthine maze of similar looking corridors and stair wells, their footsteps sounding loud as thunder in Klaus' ears, everything the same uniform shade of concrete grey and metal. There's lighting at least, which bespoke of a working electric grid and power source but they don't encounter anyone else and the place obviously hasn't been renovated for residential use. That brings up some questions that Klaus decides he's probably better off not knowing the answers to.
He's stressed out enough already.
They stop outside a plain metal door that looks like most of the other metal doors they've encountered and Five turns to them. "Ok, first rule; don't do anything stupid. The twins can be...unpredictable."
"What are the other rules?" Allison asks and Five glances at her. "Follow rule number one and you won't need to know," he replies.
Well, that sounded ominous.
Five opens the door.
Klaus isn't certain what the room's original function might have been but it's recently been converted into a makeshift living area with blankets, a few cots and some packaged food. It's spartan, not even a little bit domestic and looks more like a squatter's hovel than any kind of safe house. The only thing that makes it recognizable as Five's sanctum sanctorum are the equations scribbled all over everything.
Against the far wall are two small figures, no larger than children, their backs to the group. They're scribbling steadily away and - from what Klaus can tell - are both working opposite ends of the same sprawling equation that's taking up most of the wall, each moving closer to the other as they inch inward toward the center point.
Klaus is just about to say something stupid to break the ice when they both stop mid-stroke, chalk pieces hovering. After a moment they slowly drop their arms and set the chalk aside, movements in tandem and perfect copies of each other. They stick their hands in their pockets. They step away from the wall. It's so flawlessly synchronized Klaus swears he's seeing double.
They slowly turn.
Klaus gasps.
Dave's favorite book had been Dune, a book Klaus never read before his time in 'Nam. He read it then because Dave had wanted him to, handing over the battered soft-cover with a shy smile. After Dave died, after Klaus came back because there was no reason to stay in the past anymore he hunted down a copy for himself. Same cover, same publication date.
He reads it a lot; it makes him feel a little closer to the man he loved.
So it's extra super weird for him when the kids turn around and their eyes are swallowed up in electric blue; very much the way he'd imagined the "blue-within-blue" eyes that had been described in Dune to look. The only real difference is instead of the dark blue of the novel these kids have eyes the same color as Five's warp ability; a crystalline, icy blue that crackles with energy.
And they're both perfect carbon copies of Five...when he'd been about six years old.
"Shit," says Diego eloquently and Klaus agrees wholeheartedly.
(Author's Note: For anyone who wants to read the time travel scene from Five's POV check out chapter 10 of Ashes and Dust. Yes, I've had this planned for that long.)