Do Not Stand at My Grave and Weep

by Rarae

Summary:

What if when they had went back in time Reginald found out that Klaus couldn't die and, in true Hargreeves fashion, decided to test this new ability. Over and over and over again.

Klaus, determined not to let his siblings down again, goes along with it and submits to whatever new tortures Reggie comes up with. Cue concerned siblings and family bonding.

Notes:

Warning: There are mentions of suicide and semi-graphic depictions of death and torture.

Klaus had always seemed to carry the cold around with him, Vanya noticed. Even on the hottest summer days there was always this vague sort of aura that followed him wherever he went. You could always tell when Klaus was close by the shiver than ran up your spine. A side effect of the whole ghost thing, they all assumed.

She couldn’t help but find it unsettling and try to surreptitiously avoid him, not that it was hard given her normal lack of presence in family affairs.

But then the end of the word had to come knocking at everyone’s door and Vayna felt that same creeping cold seep into her bones as her violin song swelled and everything turned into a maelstrom of sights and sounds and feelings and guns and was that Ben? And, oh God, what was happening?

And then there was nothing but silence and a chill creeping up her spine.

***

They woke back up in their thirteen year old bodies with their thirty year old brains because thanks Five. Klaus summarily chalked it up to further evidence that math sucks and equations won’t get you anywhere in life besides stuck in the past without even the ability to grow facial hair yet.

Also he had a headache.

“Well this sucks,” a familiar voice grumbled off to his side. Ah, at least Ben came with him for this jaunty venture into the past. Things could always be worse, he supposed. Case in point- he hadn’t started the harder drugs yet at this point so there was no need to go through withdrawal again! He wasn’t homeless anymore (at least until they went back) and Klaus knew for a fact that he had several Hershey’s stashed away in a shoebox under his bed at this very moment. See? Positives.

Being thirteen could have its perks. You don't have to pay taxes when you're thirteen (not that he did anyways- he didn't fear man, God, or the IRS). Except for the whole having to train and support Vanya thing so she didn’t cause the end of the world and end all life in the universe as we know it schtick. That part was, admittedly, a bummer. But you win some, you lose some.

Klaus hummed.

He gathered his courage to sit up and look around. Ben was holding his head- could ghosts get headaches? Five was passed out next to him and Vanya was still unconscious as well. Luther, Allison, Diego, and Ben were all awake and at varying levels of awareness. Allison, for her part, looked like she had just been woken up at 3am by a raccoon with an inordinate love of teenage girls’ fashion that had climbed in through the window and began ravaging her closet. Ah, that had been a fun day, Klaus thought. He maintained that he wasn't he fault that the raccoon got in. Anyone could have left that window open.

“Wha’? Ben?” Diego slurred.

“Hi.” Ben raised his hand in an awkward wave.

“Oh! You guys can see him?” Klaus asked.

Diego raised a palm to his forehead and closed his eyes tightly. “The fuck’s gon’ on?”

“You have a migraine too, mon frère?”

“Shut up, Klaus,” Five interjected in all of his impatient, stick-in-the-ass glory. “We appear to be in the right time, but we need to make sure because we cannot fuck this up again. He leveled a look at each and every one of them, perhaps lingering a moment longer on Luther, but maybe that was just Klaus’s over-hopeful imagination.

“We need to find a newspaper or something, check to see if everything is in proper order and that we haven’t broken the time stream irreparably by all of us jumping here at once.”

Five was meet with five equally blank looks.

A beat later Luther stood up and tried to look more the part of Number One, leader extraordinaire and less idiot monkey boy whose head hurt and didn’t know what was going on. Dealer’s choice as to whether or not he managed, but Klaus rather thought he looked ready to keel over at any moment. “What exactly just happened, Five? And,” he turned to look at Ben with wide eyes, “Ben? I- just, how? It’s good to see you and all, especially after the whole-” he mimed his stomach exploding and a bunch of wiggly tentacles coming out.

“Well, you know, I was in the neighborhood.”

“Guys, focus! Ben, I love you dearly and we can have a whole blubbering reunion later, but the apocalypse is still on and we need a game plan.”

Klaus groaned. Five needed to learn the art of sloth and taking a fucking break every once in a while.

“But the apocalypse is years away now,” Allison said, having finally made sense of what was happening and where when they now were. “Surely we can take a five minute breather.” Allison knows what’s up, Klaus thought.

Five’s face scrunched up as he took in the haggard appearances of his siblings and the prone form of Vanya lying on the ground. He noticed that she was beginning to move a little. “Fine. Three minutes and then we talk.” He walked over and sat gingerly in the space between Luther and Vanya, a crotchety gargoyle of a protector, but a guardian nonetheless.

Just then the door leading from the courtyard into the house opened and the siblings were meet with the looming figure of Sir Reginald Hargreeves, in all of his bastardly glory. Bastard, Klaus thought.

“Number One, what is the meaning of this? You are all meant to be training.” He emphasized his point with a sharp tap of his cane onto the ground, the noise it making Klaus lean ever so slightly more toward Ben and away from the man that, at the root of it, was the cause of this whole mess.

“Well, fuck.” Fuck, Klaus thought as soon as the words left his mouth, I should not have said that.

***

Training under Reginald wasn’t always the painstaking torture it eventually morphed into. Once upon a time it was actually fun, for a given definition of the word. Besides the occasional late night rendezvous that dropped in frequency as they got older, group training was the only instance where the siblings could talk to one another. Unless there was a concrete reason to do otherwise Reginald would leave group training sessions under the care of Pogo or Luther who, while a hardass, would at least let them talk amongst themselves- so long as they were still beating the shit out of each other, of course.

Faint memories of debating with Diego about the best donut flavor (boston creme, obviously) and crowing to Allison about how he had stolen her third favorite skirt again bubbled to the forefront of Klaus's mind. He was on his eighth day in the mausoleum, he had run out of water yesterday, the ghosts, in concordance with his new and uncontrolled ability to manifest spirits, had started leaving faint gashes and bruises on his arms, and everything was going just great.

Great. Yeah. Just, great. Individual training is and has always been literal, actual Hell.

Though Heaven wasn’t that great either, Klaus thought. Too monochrome and that little girl was a bit of a bitch. Also, she had a bike? No halfway decent Heaven would involve exercise of any kind.

The headache he’d had when they arrived had only gotten worse under the constant barrage of screaming. KLAUS KLAUS HELP US SAVE US WHERE AM I HE KILLED ME TELL MY SON TELL MY DAUGHTER TELL- KLAUS MY BODY, IT’S-

They just wouldn’t stop. They reached and grabbed and tugged and clawed at him, desperate to be touched, to be heard. Helped. Klaus scoffed and pulled his legs in tighter, resting his head between them so that they covered his ears. He couldn’t even help himself. He was so cold. Exhaustion weighed him down like a cinder-block dragging a soon-to-be corpse down into the ocean depths.

The door to the mausoleum creaked open and an even more terrifying silhouette stood in the doorway, illuminated by the midday sun like an angel of vengeance. Though the angel himself would rather liken himself to God. Powerful, in control, and more intelligent than the lesser beings that surrounded him.

“Have you learned your lesson yet, Number Four?” The figure intones, as merciless and distant as always.

Klaus almost misses the question in and amongst the cacophony of other voices yelling in his ears. “Yes, Father.” His voice is scratchy from his own screaming and from the lack of water. But is his voice really scratchy if no one cares to notice? Perhaps not. If Reginald cares enough to notice, he doesn’t comment.

Klaus stands up on shaky legs and staggers to the entrance of the tomb. Reginald doesn’t move for a moment, staring at the scratches that litter his child’s arms and legs. What one might call a smile graced Reginald’s face for a brief instant (or was it satisfaction? Eagerness? Cruelty? Klaus wasn’t sure and he was too tired to try and figure it out anyways) before his usual blankness returned.

“I see that despite your best efforts your powers have progressed. Excellent. We will begin further training of your abilities tomorrow at 1500. Do not be late,” Reginald ordered and turned crisply to walk back to the car waiting for him a couple dozen feet away, leaving Klaus alone and stunned in the doorway of the mausoleum.

He watched as Pogo drove Reginald back to the Academy without a backwards glance. Well, looks like he’d be walking back- it would probably take him an hour with his legs as stiff as they were and judging by the sun it also looked like he would miss dinner, though he wished he had a clock to confirm that.

Great. This week just keeps getting better and better. What new horrors- no pun intended Ben- would Reggie cook up this go ‘round?

He completed the walk back slowly, shivering from the dusky New England chill. The uniform shorts he was wearing were definitely not created with being outside in mind. Reggie probably did that to spite Klaus specifically. Fuckers. His bruises seemed to ache more than they did in the mausoleum- there was less to distract him now from the pain with most the screaming ghosties still haunting the cemetery. It was moments like this he missed always having Ben with him, selfish as the desire was. God, he was such a needy fuck up. He couldn’t even keep the ghosts at bay...

Klaus made it back just after sunset, missing dinner, and planned on bypassing going to Mom for his scratches and opting instead to pass out in bed until it was time for breakfast. It’s a shame his plans never work out.

“Klaus!” Luther’s angry ‘I am Number One and you will listen to me if you value your life’ voice called out from down the hall. Now if this just wasn’t the cherry on top of the fucking cake that was his life. The hell to his fucking. The gravity to his ice cream cone. The- “Where have you been? We’ve been spending the past week trying to come up with a way to train Vanya and not let Dad know what’s going on without you because you decided to go on another one of your- your! Drug thingies!”

“You mean a bender?” Christ, he was not in the mood for this.

Luther’s voice was seething. “It doesn’t matter. Point is, I thought you were past all this, but I guess we shouldn’t have expected anything less from you. If you won’t work with us then you might as well keep being a nuisance like always and keep Dad out of our hair so we can do the real work. As per usual,” he finished with a disappointed scowl, turning to head back to wherever the fuck Luther goes when not harassing Klaus. Probably flexing in the mirror and complaining about the moon.

But, you know what, how dare he? How dare he assume that Klaus was incapable of anything but being a dead weight? He helped! It’s not his fault that Dad was a capital ‘D’ Douche and kept him locked up this past week. Did Luther not think that there could possibly be any other reason he was gone this past week? Did Luther forget about the whole blue ghosty tentacle bit at the concert? They totally would have been dead meat if it weren’t for him. And Ben.

“Hey! Fuck you, kemosabi! What happened to, like, supporting each other and sibling bonding and all that other horse shit?”

Luther stops in his tracks and turns heel, expression murderous and damn if the impact of that glare didn’t have the same impact in a non-monkeyfied and three-foot shorter body.

“Now, you listen here Number Four, we don’t need a dead weight loose canon right now. We already have one of those with Vanya and I won’t allow another one on this team.” Luther was finally close enough to grab Klaus’s shirt and push him against the fall, holding him there suspended so that his toes were just an inch or two shy of the ground. Klaus was suddenly reminded of the time Luther got drunk and choked his scrawny little junkie self out before leaving him dead on the club floor.

“So shape up, pull your weight, and keep out of trouble. If you can manage to do that without screwing it up. Got it?” He said, emphasizing the point by shoving him against the wall again.

Unfortunately, Klaus's mouth didn’t always get the memo from his brain that said ‘shut up you idiot before you get us killed again.’ And Klaus was pissed. He had just gone through hell again for the sake of this fucked up joke of a family, to help Vanya, and all he wanted was to finally get some sleep after freezing his ass off and now Luther has the nerve to storm up to him with all of his usual bullshit and alpha-male posturing.

“Well, fuck you!” God, he wished Ben was here right now. He was at least 95% of his impulse control and also moral support. “At least I didn’t lock Vanya up like a rabid dog, now did I? And I wasn’t such a disappointment that Dad had to abandon me on the fucking moon because he couldn’t stand to look at my ugly-ass monkey body, now did he?” Klaus's voice was venomous, every word dripping with malice, like the fangs of a viper before it strikes.

Luther always was handy, though, with a shovel. Dear ol’ Reggie used to send him out to take care of the snakes that dared to infiltrate the sacred and hallowed grounds of the Academy. Klaus could see the fire that lit up in Luther’s eyes at his comment and braced himself for the barely-restrained punch of someone with super-strength. Instead he was rather gracelessly thrown across the room and hit his head on the wall.

He felt warm blood dripping off the back of his head and down his back as he slumped forward. And then he knew nothing at all.

***

Klaus woke up slowly and then all at once. He was foggy and trying to think was like wading through a marshy pit. Where was he? Jesus fuck, he was cold. Where was he and couldn’t they spring for better indoor heating? Cold rooms combined with the uniquely unpleasant chill ghosts brought with them made for a distasteful situation. He flexed his fingers and managed to feel mildly surprised when he felt them scrape across barren metal.

How odd, he normally woke up from his OD’s and binges alone in some alley he had wandered into or, on better mornings, in the hotel or bedroom of whomever bedded him the previous night.

“Hello dear, it’s time to get up now,” he heard Mom say as she gently began removing his IV, which he had been unaware of until he felt the distinct twinge of the needle coming out. You never do get used to that feeling. But Mom’s presence answered the question of where he was.

Wait, didn’t those two goons in the mask unplug her? What was… oh yes. He was in the past and Mom was fine.

“M’m? Wha’ happn’d?” He opened his eyes to see her smiling down at him. She took his face in one hand and leaned down to kiss him on the forehead. Not to be Diego or anything, but he really loved his Mom.

“You gave us quite the scare there! Pogo found you in the living room with such a nasty head wound. We quickly brought you here for treatment but you didn’t have a heartbeat or any brain function.”

Ah, so Luther had left him for dead. Again. That motherfucking bitch…

“But then, the most unexpected thing happened. About twenty minutes after you were declared dead, your heart started back up again.” She stopped her bustling around with the medical equipment for a moment to look at Klaus and she whispered, as though it was a great secret that must not be overheard, “I was very relieved, my dear. I would have missed you.”

Klaus let out a humorless huff of a laugh. “Thanks, Mom,” he said and he meant it too. If Reginald heard her say something like that she’d be reprogrammed in less than a heartbeat. He’d always wondered if maybe Mom had somehow developed emotions over the years. It wasn’t in her original design, but, loathe as he was to admit it, Sir Reginald Hargreeves was a genius with robotics and considering they lived with a sentient chimpanzee it wasn’t impossible or even improbable to believe that he might have accidentally created a sentient robot caregiver with feelings.

The conspiratorial smile stayed on her face for another blessed moment before settling back to her normal, more placid smile. “Now, you stay here dear and rest up while I let Sir Hargreeves know that you’ve finally woken up.”

He grabbed her wrist in a moment of unprecedented energy. “Please, not yet. Just give me a few more minutes?”

She almost looked sad, he thought. ”I’m sorry Klaus but he was very clear that I was to let him know immediately when you woke up.” He could hear the underlying 'if you woke up' and 'I’ve delayed as long as I can' in her words. His hand dropped back to the medical table and he gave her a weak smile.

“Okay, Mom. Thanks.”

"Hey, wait!" He called out.

Grace paused at the doorway. "Yes, dear?"

"I love you."

"I love you too, dear," she smiled. She then left and the silence that remained in her wake was stifling. Even the ghosts weren’t screaming at him just then. There were only two in the corner at the moment and they didn’t even look too mutilated and bloody. One had a rather large welt on the back of his head and the young woman didn’t have anything wrong with her at first glance.

He decided to take the brief respite to catalog what the fuck had just happened. Okay, so, he had spent a week in the mausoleum (and the scratches and bruises he had earned there had been carefully wrapped and soothed with various ointments), he got in a fight with Luther because he’s a giant prick with no sense of awareness of what was going on around him, Luther threw him across the room and he hit his head, and, according to Mom, he was found dead and woke up a few minutes later. No ghostly meeting with God this time, though. Jesus Christ, what even was his life?

He’d be edgy around Luther for the next little while but, all in all, he didn’t come out of this too bad- just another notch in his deathly totem pole. This made six (?) times that he had died. Three more times and he was officially a cat, he thought with a laugh. Me-ow! Either he was funnier than he thought or Mom had sneaked him some of the good drugs. No opioids though- she knew better, even at this point in the timeline.

“Is there something about this that amuses you Number Four?” Sir Reginald Hargreeves said from the doorway. He walked with purpose, his cane clack-clack-clacking against the tile flooring, reverberating and taking up all the space in the room with its mild cacophony. Well, fuck. This wasn’t ideal.

Who was he kidding, though? Since when had his life even been ideal? Murphy's law was the very definition of Klaus's life.

“No, sir.”

He lowered his head to look at Klaus, peering at him as though he was a particularly interesting laboratory rat, one who had just led to a revolutionary breakthrough in science as we know it, but also one that was just a little bit revolting, even for a rat. “Today has been a breakthrough, Number Four.” When Klaus didn’t respond he continued, “The others are not to be informed of this development. We shall begin honing your new ability at 0800 tomorrow; report to me immediately after breakfast.”

He was far too drained to even think of fighting Reggie on this. Not that it ever did any good. “Yes, sir.” His voice sounded empty, even to his own ears.

“Perhaps you won’t turn out to be as much of a disappointment as I believed. Do not disappoint me, as you are prone to do. This could be a new chapter for you, Number Four, a chance to be less of a burden on me and your team. I recommend you don't waste it.” With his final threat made, Hargreeves left to continue whatever he was doing before he was so rudely disturbed by the news of his son’s death. He was probably excitedly coming up with new ways to torture Klaus at his training session tomorrow. Klaus didn’t think he could manage another week at the cemetery so soon after the last one.

He laid there for several long minutes attempting to sleep, but the chill of the hospital wing and the ghosts prevented him from even thinking about becoming comfortable. Should he tell his siblings what had happened? No, they were too busy training with Vanya and that needed to come first before his whining about extra training, something most of them would kill for (ha! No pun intended).

Since he couldn’t get comfortable and since his thoughts kept racing in an endless track, Klaus decided to forgo sleep and sneak back to his room. He’d sleep when he was dead. If he ever managed to finally kick the bucket that is…. Maybe he could just tell Ben? Or Diego? No, no, no. Diego might consider taking his side just to piss off Luther but he was in change of teaching Vanya control and focus. It takes a lot of effort to control his knives so precisely and keep focus in the midst of the distractions of fighting after all. As for Ben… well, he was busy reconnecting with the siblings he couldn’t talk to for the better part of 13 years. He didn’t need to involve himself with Klaus's petty problems anymore and Klaus was selfish for even considering it.

In the end, Klaus didn’t sleep. He spent the rest of the afternoon and night alternating between chain smoking, glaring at the ghosts in his room that, unlike the ones in the infirmary, never stopped screaming, and trying not to think too hard about the current situation.

Then, all too soon, it was morning and time to face the music.

Breakfast passed without any fanfare, as usual, as they listened to what’s-his-face talk about edible plants of South Africa or some shit. Like they’d ever need to know that. No one commented on his absence and Luther didn’t even deign to look at him. Bastard. Ben gave him a very worried glances- he was the only one of them who even knew to consider that he might have been in the mausoleum, but he didn’t dare say anything while at the table. There was no sense in disturbing the peace so soon over something so minor in the grand scheme of things.

Time kept resolutely marching forward, despite Klaus's attempts to discover a latent ability to stop it, and 0800 arrived to see Klaus standing in the center of the hospital room facing his father with resolute silence. Though if that was an act or bravery or beaten-down resolution, he couldn’t say. 0830 came and went and Klaus was strapped down to a chair with a poison-filled needle in his arm and an oxygenated cannula in his nose. 0835 saw Klaus dead with Hargreeves excitedly peering over at him while Mom and Pogo held their tongues.

***

He woke up in a grayscale world with his uniform acting as the only source of color and since it was mostly a dark blue Klaus didn’t think it should count. There was the bike path that he had seen last time he was here, but no little girl, and Klaus wasn’t sure if that was a blessing or a curse. He was in the middle of a forest, but he couldn’t tell if there was anything beyond the trees.

Maybe Dave was here and maybe he could stay long enough to see him this time and with the little girl conspicuously absent there was nothing to stop him from looking. So, he started walking- not following the bike trail, thank you very much. He wasn’t that stupid.

If pressed, Klaus couldn’t say how long he walked, not that anyone would press, but it felt like hours. Briefly, he wondered if time worked the same here or if his body had been dead for hours. At this, memories of how he died this time wormed their way to the forefront of his mind.

It hadn’t been drugs, or an angry drug dealer, or even Luther this time. Good old Reggie, the esteemed Sir Reginald Hargreeves, the Olympic gold medalist and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize and founder of the highly praised Umbrella Academy, had done this. Dad, his Dad had done this. Not that he had ever been a great father, but torture-training your kids and locking them up is one thing. Straight up killing them for the sake of science is another thing altogether.

You weren't even allowed to kill lab rats without good reason to do, but ethics never seemed to have much bearing on Reginald's experiments.

But, he thought, Reginald would probably be content after this (if he revives this time, that is- God should have found and sent him back by now). He would have proof that Klaus couldn’t die and then things would go back to normal. He hoped. Even he wouldn’t keep going after this- the risks would be too high, right? He had to have some morals.

Klaus shoved these thoughts to the side and kept walking. Jesus H. Christ- what if this was it? What if he was finally dead and the rest of eternity was just him walking ceaselessly in this stupid gray forest? That was a sobering thought. Even so, death was such a far-off concept for him. How could it not be when he faced it every second of every day? Sure, people died. But did they really? Ghosts didn’t and neither does Klaus, at the end of the day, and if that isn’t the biggest kick in the teeth.

Eventually, he came to a clearing with a cottage-like building on the other side. Its log frame was as equally drab as the rest of this hellish purgatory but the structure stood out among the rest of the forest. The door was slightly ajar, but the smoke coming from the chimney and the soft flowers in the window boxes prevented the whole thing from taking on a more murder-esque cabin in the woods quality.

He started to walk towards the cottage. Maybe it was Dave in there, maybe not, but he still held onto a sliver of hope that it would be. At least there was no chance it was Reggie this time. However, God in Her omniscient timing chose that moment to ring the bell on Her bike. Klaus paused as he watched Her ride up, stopping in between him and the house. She looked at him with the air of someone so put upon to do something that it’s a monument to man’s audacity that they dare ask in the first place.

“You’re back. Why?”

He grinned and propped a hand on his hip. “Well,” he drawled, “last time was just so fun I just had to try again. Addicts always want more, you know.”

She remained unimpressed. “It’s not your time yet and I don’t want you here.”

He let his hand fall to his side and, in that moment, looked all of thirteen years old. “It’s not like I wanted to come here,” he groused.

“You need to go back. You’re too early.”

“And I will, I will! Just… please. Give me five minutes. I want to see Dave. Is he in there?” Klaus made to walk around the girl into the cottage, but a sudden hand on his chest stopped him. The child was no longer on Her bike but standing directly in front of his path. Damn, She was fast.

“It’s not time yet.”

Klaus reached up to his chest to touch Her hand and intended to gently lower it. “Please, I promise I’ll go back. I just want to see him again.”

She raised her other hand and snapped Her fingers and Klaus could feel himself being pulled back to the land of the living, his vision of this world fading quickly. He closed his eyes.

“Klaus?” A voice called out.

Dave? Was that Dave? No! Dave! He tried to hang on, to stay, but he was falling falling falling.

It was dark and cold. Why is death so cold?

He opened his eyes.

***

0845 was no different. Neither was 0900. Or 0930.

0935 saw a worried Grace hovering over her son, so worried that Hargreeves had finally killed one of her children. Pogo could only think of how he had placidly allowed this to happen. Hargreeves, for his part, was beginning to wonder if what had happened yesterday was a fluke or a mistake. Either way, it was no great loss if Number Four didn’t revive this time. The data he had already gathered was interesting enough and Number Four was not especially helpful on missions. Indeed, he was rather a detriment to the smooth workings of the household.

At 0938 Klaus Hargreeves woke up from his seventh death with a great gasp of air and with a splitting headache. Grace jumped to steady him, quickly measuring his vitals and scanning him for brain damage. Nothing appeared to be out of place, but there would be more tests later before making the final call.

With Klaus's breathing under control, he turned to Sir Hargreeves, who was writing on his ever-present notepad.

“Sixty-eight minutes,” Hargreeves said with a vague air of disappointment. The lab rat was not up to par today.

“Sir?” His voice was weak and he couldn’t help but notice the mottled bruise on his arm where the needle went in. It was turning a sickly poison-green.

“You revived after sixty-eight minutes, Number Four. Not bad for a first attempt but I expect with training we can get that down to as little as five minutes.”

His mind struggled to keep up with what Old Man Reggie was saying. First attempt? Surely not. “You mean we’re doing this again?”

“Yes. I believe I just said that. Do check his hearing Grace. It wouldn’t do to damage him so early on in the trials.”

“Yes, sir. Right away.”

“That’s enough for today, I should think. Come back tomorrow at the same time, Number Four. Don’t be late.

Well, fuck. Of course once wasn’t enough. Of course it wasn’t. Klaus had been a fool to think otherwise. Reggie was going to test this again and again and again until he had the results he was looking for and Klaus would die trying.

Maybe… maybe now was the time to sound the alert? Tell Ben? This was going a bit farther than normal training. They wouldn’t stand for this. They would agree this was going Too Far™ and help him stop this. Right?

Right?

A wriggling worm of doubt whispered in his ear. But what if? What if they said he was being a wimp about this and should just suck it up. Or, worse, what if they didn’t believe him? He didn’t have the best track record with them about these sorts of things, after all. They didn’t believe him about getting sober, about time travelling to 1968, about seeing Ben, about touching Ben (until the whole concert debacle). Yeah, they definitely wouldn’t believe him about this.

And while this sucked so hard, it could be worse. If Reggie was focused on him then he would be too busy to catch on to everyone being nice to Vanya and the secret training she was getting. Maybe this was for the best. He would be useful this way, for the first time in a long long time…

Yes, he decided. He was going to keep this to himself and continue doing what he was best at- being an attention-seeking nuisance and keep Reginald distracted.

***

What surprised Klaus the most about the new arrangement was how little things really changed. Life continued. He kept expecting his siblings to notice how worn down he was becoming, how the bags under his eyes deepened, and how twitchy he now was. To their credit, they did notice the increased frequency of his individual training. But, to Five, Luther, Allison, and Diego’s discredit, they were mostly jealous of this fact. It really was just like when they were actually thirteen.

Luther wanted to continue being Number One, large and in charge and daddy dearest’s favorite- not that there was any real competition. Allison, Diego, and Five all realized that individual training was never exactly fun, but they did desire the pride that came with being noticed and deemed worthy of Reginald’s one-on-one attention. However, this is not to say that they didn’t all (minus Vanya) receive individual training at some point.

Ben, after Reginald poisoned Klaus to death for what Klaus thought was the nineteenth time (the “experiments” had all started to blend together), noticed that Klaus was more quiet than normal and cornered him one evening, demanding an explanation. Was it drugs or something worse?

Klaus, half for the sake of being contrary and half to protect his secret, claimed that he’d decided to start clubbing early this go ‘round and, well, what couldn’t drugs and a lack of sleep explain? (Many things, but nothing that anyone cared to notice.)

His ghostly bosom buddy, however, was smarter than most people gave him credit for- and he was given a lot of credit- and dropped the subject but continued keeping an eye out for Klaus. He didn’t believe for a second that Klaus had taken up drugs again. The signs simply weren’t there. There were no new bruises, no lingering soreness, no track marks, no schemes to pilfer money.

No, this was something else, he decided, something he should inform the others about.

***

Ben convened a meeting, instructing the five of them to meet him in his room at midnight, enough past bedtime that it would be assumed that they were all asleep. They trickled in one by one, Luther arriving at 12 o’clock on the dot and Five popping in last at a fashionable 10 minutes late.

“So, why’d you call us all here, Ben? We’re missing valuable sleep time,” Diego said.

“And where’s Klaus?” Vanya asked. She had been becoming more vocal these past few weeks, enough to where she contributed in family conversations where before she would have remained a silent spectre.

Ben took a deep breath. He would need to tread carefully here or everyone would break out into an argument, as per their usual m.o. “I asked you all here because I wanted to talk about Klaus.”

“Is he on drugs again?” Allison asked. She, too, had noticed his more haggard appearance, but chose not to think too hard on it. One didn’t survive living in this house by caring too much about its other occupants, though she was trying to do better. Klaus just made it so hard.

Luther butted in before Ben could answer. “I don’t think he ever stopped.”

Ben and Diego turned matching glares towards him.

“Now wait a minute-!” Diego started.

“He’s clean as far as I know,” Ben interrupted before a fight could break out. They were all just so exhausting. It was times like this he almost wished he was a ghost again just so he could tune all of this out when they got to be too much.

Luther snorted and Diego socked him on the shoulder. But, before Luther could retaliate Ben continued, “But there is definitely something wrong with him. Have you guys noticed anything weird going on with him?”

“He’s been more tired than usual,” Vanya noted. “And he’s been sneaking me chocolate at night, though I think that’s just him trying to be nice.” She had the hint of a smile on her face. “He hasn’t been sneaking into my room too late at night though or, like, every day, so I don’t think the two are connected, actually.” Ben nodded his thanks.

“I’ve noticed that too,” Diego said. “He’s been more twitchy too, but that’s probably just because of the ghosts. He’s always been a little… neurotic.” There were a few hums of agreement.

Everyone sat quiet for a moment before Allison said, “He’s been have more special training sessions with Dad. They only last a couple hours, but still. That could be why.”

The continued drug cravings probably weren’t helping, either, Ben thought.

“He’s lucky,” Luther mumbled.

“Oh shut up Luther. We all know special training always sucks,” Five admonished. They all had their skeletons in the closet, but the one they all shared was the horrors of special training (and special punishments), memories of being forced to jump with his hands tied, of being made to sit underwater for hours and days at a time, of being gagged, of being locked away, of being isolated. They each had their own private hells.

Luther glared at Five but didn’t comment further.

“But, Allison’s right,” Five said. “It’s probably just the extra training. It sucks but there’s nothing we can do and we have more important priorities at the moment, like preventing the apocalypse,” Five concluded, nodding at Vanya.

Ben didn’t like it, but they were probably right. Until Klaus said something, there was precious little they could do. It was no good starting a fight with Dad until they knew for sure what was going on and Klaus never told anyone anything unless he wanted to. For as much as he talked he was surprisingly recalcitrant when it came to his personal life.

They would just have to wait and keep an eye on things.

***

Weeks after the initial experiment the time between Reginald injecting the poison and Klaus waking back up had decreased to around ten minutes. Still short of Reginald’s goal, but acceptable enough that Sir Hargreeves declared that training sessions would become bi-weekly instead of three times a week, like they had been. It was a weak consolation prize, though, when Reggie announced that they would be moving on from poison to “other methods.”

“It is necessary to test more variables for a more complete understanding of your capabilities and the extent to which they can work.”

“What?” What? Klaus was breathless and felt his heart stop for a brief second. He would know- it had been forcibly stopped enough times by now. This couldn’t be happening. The poison was bad enough but he wasn’t sure if he could survive (both literally and metaphorically) anything more.

“Surely… surely that’s not necessary. We’ve already proven that I’ll revive when, when killed and I’ve been coming back in less time each time. And I still haven’t reach five minutes! Shouldn’t we keep going until, until, you know, I reach that goal?” His voice was squeaking towards the end, despite his best efforts not to let his fear bleed through.

Sir Reginald wasn’t so easily convinced or swayed, however. “Clearly you have not made as much progress as I had thought, Number Four, if you are still afraid of your powers. On missions, your adversaries will not always be so kind as to use poison. You must be prepared to revive quickly from any manner of death so as to not abandon your teammates. You have the ability to become less worthless to me and to your team. I suggest you work harder to conquer this pathetic fear.” He turned to leave. “Pogo, take him to the cemetery. Clearly Number Four needs more time to get over his hesitance. Training will commence in a week.”

Klaus could just about cry. He could feel his breaths coming in faster and faster, to the point where he didn’t think he was getting any oxygen in at all. Not again. God, please, not again. Why did She hate him so much? He hadn’t done anything. Pogo gently pulled him up and guided him out of the house and to the car.

As he sat in the passenger seat, he saw more than felt the tears fall and hit his lap. His previous panic quickly melted into a strange apathy. He seemed to watch as they drove to the cemetery and he was locked into the tomb. The ghosts screamed and begged and tried to hurt him, but it was as if he was an outside observer.

The rest of his time there passed much the same way, with Klaus numb without the aid of drugs and his consciousness floating away like the more disincorporated phantoms.

Some time later, hours or months, he couldn’t tell, the door opened and Sir Hargreeves there again stood, the sun shining through like Heaven shining through the clouds. “Have you learned your lesson this time, Number Four?”

“Yes, sir,” he heard himself say. He thought that perhaps this time it wasn’t even too much of a lie.

“Excellent. Let us continue the trials. Follow me.”

“Yes, sir.” He stood on shaky legs and followed Hargreeves to the car, still numb. He shivered as he sat next to Hargreeves- the cold wouldn’t seem to leave him and the man’s silence seemed to welcome the chill.

They drove back to the Academy in silence, with the gravity of a prisoner walking down death row.

***

Resigned, he walked to that room every time his father ordered, not daring to protest as Hargreeves invented countless new ways to murder his son. After several months, protesting didn’t even occur to him anymore.

The medical bed was now bare of sheets and pillows. Instead a thick plastic canvas covered the bed, giving the room a crazy-psycho-serial-killer aesthetic. Not that that was too far off from the truth.

Hargreeves cycled through what must have been dozens of types of new poisons- Klaus refused to keep track anymore after poison #17, strychnine.

Next was various methods of exsanguination and other Fun With Knives™- knife through the gut, piercing his heart, slitting his throat (oh God, is this what Allison went through?), slicing various veins and arteries, and so so many more. Jesus Christ, this was insane. Klaus felt nauseous thinking about it. Reggie had really gone off his rocker.

Nevertheless, he continued going to the muder room and laying down like a lamb for slaughter.

Electrocution, strangulation, suffocation, drowning, crushing, blunt force trauma (and if that one wasn’t a bitch and a half then Klaus didn’t know what was).

Hargreeves stopped short of severely maiming him- neither thought he could manage to come back from decapitation or cutting off limbs. He wasn’t a lizard. Never did Klaus think that was something he would need to be thankful for one day.

It took four years before guns made an appearance, by which time Klaus had started to think the noise and messiness of it had put Hargreeves off from attempting it. That was until they took a trip on Friday night to the cemetery.

Pogo had driven them St. John and parked them in their normal location in front of the graves of James and Melissa Canterbury (1861-1942, 1864-1950) and Cameron McWilliams (1873-1931) and just adjacent to the mausoleum of Frederick Miller where Klaus has spent months of his life (he was a real bastard). Frozen to his seat, Klaus couldn’t make himself get out of the car.

Impatient as always, Hargreeves tapped on his windshield with his cane. “Out, now, Number Four.”

Klaus's eyes widened. “Please, no. Not again.” His breaths were coming in heavy and he couldn’t seem to be able to breathe. He grabbed onto his seatbelt, worrying at it with scrabbling fingers. He was doing so good. So good. He wasn’t mouthing off whenever Reggie came up with a new way to kill him. He was doing better on missions- he was still lookout more often than not, but he was doing better at it, getting distracted less, paying more attention. Why now? He hadn’t done anything!

During his panic session Pogo had opened the door, unlocked the seatbelt, and was gently dragging a flailing and hyperventilating Klaus out of the door.

“Number Four, Number Four!” Someone gently shook him and he heard Pogo whisper a gentle Klaus into his ear, the contrast of his number and his name startling him to attention.

Klaus grabbed Pogo’s arms to steady himself and turned a pleasing look towards Reginald. “Father, please, not again. I’ve been doing better, sir. I’ve completely conquered my fear of the dead!” He lied.

“Calm yourself, Four. This behavior is very unbecoming and I expected more from you after all this time.” Klaus was barely holding back tears. He was so worn thin and he wasn’t sure he could handle this anymore- he hadn’t been locked in the mausoleum in four years, the very beginning of this whole ordeal.

“You are not here to combat your fears of ghosts, though if this unseemly wailing continues I may have to reconsider my position on the matter. We are here to continue your reanimation training.”

“Oh,” Klaus breathed. “Oh. Okay.” Strangely enough, the knot in his throat didn’t seem to retreat at the news.

“We will begin our firearm trials here. The location is secluded enough and in such an… unsightly part of town that no one will intervene in the experiments. Pogo- retrieve my pistol from the car.”

“Yes, sir,” Pogo said, walking to the passenger’s seat console.

“Will there be any issues, Number Four?” He loomed over Klaus, taking advantage of their still-large height difference. (Klaus's growth spurt wasn’t due for another few months. He sprouted five inches in as many months.) His monocle glinted in the sunlight like one of Vanya’s anime villains.

He didn’t want this, he really didn’t. But was this truly any different than what had been happening already? And his siblings still needed him to keep Reginald distracted. Vanya was advancing well in her training (and, honestly, she had better control of her powers than Klaus did most days) and Five said that they wouldn’t probably be able to return home to their own time within the next six months, just as soon as he worked out the last part of his equation.

Whether they knew it or not, the others were depending on him and he wasn’t about to let them down again, like he had so many times in the past. His previous drug habit need not be mentioned here.

What was dying once more? Or a hundred times more? His family needed him and he wasn’t going to bail this time.

“No, sir. No issues.”

One curt nod later Hargreeves had loaded the pistol and instructed Klaus to lay on the plastic sheet Pogo had placed on the ground- blood spatters would be a bitch to get out of grass and the gun noise was too much evidence already. Klaus took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and heard a gunshot echo before everything was black and cold.

***

Again he woke up to a grayscale hell and a little girl staring sadly down at him.

“Please, not again.”

She looked genuinely remorseful. “I’m sorry Klaus. Really, I am.”

“Just a few more minutes, please. It’s just too much.”

Her face was soft, a sight that he couldn't have imagined when he was 13 (or 34 for that matter), but God’s pity wasn’t enough to stop Her from sending him back.

“You know that’ll just make it worse.”

“Yeah, I know.”

***

“Twenty-six minutes, Number Four. Not as long as cranial wounds, but your time has much room for improvement.”

“Yes, sir.”

***
Klaus was so tired; he just wanted this “experiment” to end. Weren’t experiments supposed to end before the lab rat died, especially if the lab rat was one of a kind and there were no other rats in the entire fucking world who could do what he did? He wanted to stop knowing. No one was meant to find out how many ways they could die, how many times he could come back to life, how fast he could come back from the dead, and what wouldn’t he come back from?

He wanted to all to fucking stop. How much more of this could he take?

He wasn’t suicidal. He wasn’t about to try and OD or pilfer one of Dad’s guns (not that it would stick anyways). But he was just so tired, so drained, and wanted it all to stop for just one moment. He wasn’t even being passively suicidal, recklessly sacrificing himself on missions or “forgetting” to care for himself.

Not that you could prove it if he was.

But he definitely wasn’t. He wasn’t about to sacrifice himself in some feet of unnecessary daring and heroism.

But then August 15th, 2006 happened.

The date loomed over all of them as the days and years passed, until it was time. They were somewhere in Latvia, trying to recover a stolen formula about who-knows-what from who-knows-who. Only who-knows-who had more goons than any reasonable person would expect.

Just like the first time they were surrounded on all sides, each one in the middle of the fray, dodging bullets and flying knives. For each enemy they struck down two more appeared- like a motherfucking hydra, Klaus thought.

The first time, Klaus was on the outskirts of the battle and could only watch as the Horror overtook Ben, ripping his body apart from the inside out. He still saw the blood whenever he closed his eyes on the darker nights and in his more disturbing dope-induced hallucinations.

On the plane ride over Ben and Klaus had held hands, each taking silent comfort in the closeness. Things hadn’t been the same between them since Ben came back to life, but they were still inseparable in the way conjoined twins and codependent couples were.

“Things are going to be different this time Benny, I promise you.”

Ben’s small smile damn near broke Klaus's heart. He didn’t believe him. “I sure hope so, but Five still hasn’t come up with a way to change things without altering the timeline.”

“Fuck the timeline! You’re more important than some bullshit fucking damn-” Klaus sputtered. Comforting words were not his specialty. Curse words were easier.

“It’s okay, Klaus. I promise. I’ve already lived more life than I was supposed to.” He took a deep breath. “And I’m okay with that, really.” He tried to give Klaus a comforting look that didn’t betray the deep anxiety that was pooling deep in his stomach. At least he hoped it was anxiety and not the Horror getting excited about the carnage that was about to come.

Fortunately for Ben, in that moment Klaus was busy formulating a last-minute but exceptionally brilliant plan to save his stupid ass tentacle-sprouting little brother. If Klaus couldn’t die then Ben wasn’t allowed to either.

It was almost time. Their enemies was crowding in and they were quickly becoming overwhelmed. Klaus and been gradually fighting closer to Ben, who had tears streaming down his face as the Horror writhed and lashed out at anyone within reach. Klaus lunged forward, dodging some idiot in a red shirt who was quickly knifed down by a flying blade that presumably came from Diego, and grabbed Ben’s hand.

Ben blearily opened his eyes to look at him. “Klaus... no,” he bit out in a strained voice. “You’ll get… hurt. Get… away! Can’t… hold them back… much longer.”

He just held on tighter. “You can do this Benny! You’re strong enough to control them! Please, come back to us- to me!”

“I… I don’t think I can Klaus. Please! Just… run!”

Ben tried to call the monsters back, but the tentacles, like contrary toddlers, fought all the more for it, rioting and piercing through bodies indiscriminately as if they were nothing more than wet tissue paper. One whipped back and plunged through Klaus's chest, ripping a hole through him and withdrawing to leave a wide-eyed Klaus to drop to the floor on his knees.

“KLAUS!! NO!” No! Nononononono this couldn’t be happening. God, it was supposed to be him. Ben looked down at his stomachs and the writhing monsters overtaking his body. No, he thought with more force than he knew he could muster.

The tentacles paused in their attack, quivering at the command, and then slowly began retreating, bowing to their hosts will, for now. They retracted back to their proper dimension and Ben dropped to his knees by Klaus and could only stare in horror.

How could this be happening? No. He had survived countless overdoses, torture, time travel, war, and more time travel only to be taken down by his own brother, by him. What was he supposed to do now? Who would he sneak out and get donuts with, make fun of Luther with, stay up late reading with (well, Ben mentally corrected, Ben read and Klaus distracted him).

How could this happen?

The battle quieted around them as the Umbrella Academy finally turned the tide. Diego whooped as his final knife took out the last henchman and Allison rumored the leader into quietly handing over the information and letting herself be handcuffed.

Amazing, they thought. We won and somehow Ben is still alive; the Horror retreated. The relief in the room was almost palpable until Five looked over at the scene across the room.

“Oh, fuck.” With a flash of blue he was by Ben and Klaus's sides. Tears were streaming down Ben’s face and landing on Klaus's chest, which was still sluggishly oozing blood. Fuck. There was just so much of it and you could see straight through his chest to the floor he was resting on.

Ben had Klaus's head cradled in his lap and was slowly rocking back and forth with a litany of “nononono” echoing the unbearable heartache he was feeling. It was supposed to be me, he repeated over and over to himself. It was supposed to be me.

This wasn’t right, Five thought. How in the fucking hell did this happen? He didn’t factor this into his equations! Ben was supposed to die; there was no other way they could restructure the timeline. But Klaus, the idiot, was supposed to stay alive! It was his one job! Why could he never do what he was supposed to?

This was all his fault. Everything- the apocalypse, Vanya, and now Klaus’s death. Goddamnit! They were supposed to all stay safe in this timeline. He spent decades trying to get to the present (well, the future) so he could save them all and now this.

Just then, Luther, Allison, and Diego walked up.

“What-” Allison began.

“No,” Diego said. “No! Ben, what happened? D-d-did… you? Did…? No.” He took a stumbling step backwards.

“I… I didn’t, I didn’t mean to! It was the Horror! I couldn’t stop them and, and, and Klaus, he wouldn’t leave and- and-” he broke off with a sob.

“We need to get back to the plane,” Luther said.

Diego turned to face him. “What?” His voice was dripping with venom. “What did you just say? Our brother is dead! And all you can think about is staying on fucking schedule with the fucking plane?” Between blinks he suddenly had a throwing knife in his hand and was prepared to hurl it at Luther’s stupid, uncaring, shitty face.

“No! No!” Luther quickly sai, putting his hands up. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

“Then what did you mean, Number One,” Five demanded as Allison placed her hand over Diego’s arm, a quiet warning to not throw the knife, no matter how much they all though Luther deserved it at the moment.

“I just meant that this isn’t the place for this.” He gestured to the piles of dead bodies littering the floor and to the mafia boss still sitting gagged and handcuffed to a chair. “We need to get him to Mom.”

Ben nodded, but no one noticed. Mom could help. She always helped.

“It’s too late for that Luther,” Allison said softly, her voice thick with unshed tears. “But you’re right. We need to get out of here.”

“Yeah,” Diego begrudgingly agreed.

“C’mon Ben,” Five said, kneeling down beside Ben and Klaus's body. "I’ll jump us to the plane." Ben sniffled.

“Okay,” he said, so quietly he could barely be heard even in the silence of the room.

In a flash of blue they were gone and the remaining three were left to transfer the prisoner to the police force waiting outside. Fortunately, Hargreeves had struck a deal allowing them to give their testimony at a later date, under the excuse that they were children who need time to process whatever ordeal they had just gone through. The real reason was, of course, that it gave them time to get their stories straight and come up with a tale that favored them in a better light than “we got pissed and accidentally killed everyone.” It was coming in handy now though as they were able to begin their all-too-long flight back to the States within 20 minutes.

The flight back was quick as Reggie wouldn’t settle for less than his very own private jet, the best and fastest that money could buy and his genius could improve. There were back at the Academy within the hour and rushed Klaus to the infirmary, where Mom was waiting with a look more solemn look than they had ever seen her with before, even when Ben had died in the original timeline.

She hooked him up to a heart monitor as the rest of the Academy looked on, confused. Vanya had been waiting for them to arrive so she could greet them, as had become the new normal, but had yet to get any explanation as to what had happened besides what she could gather from her own eyes.

The mood simply didn’t call for talking and no one wanted to be the first to break the mounting silence- that was normally Klaus's job.

Klaus had been dead for 87 minutes at this point, the longest yet.

***

Klaus, once more, woke up in the grayscale hell that is purgatory. Or maybe it really was Heaven- who’s to say? Certainly not Klaus and God was very elusive on the subject. She was very elusive about most things, Klaus had come to find.

“Hello again, Klaus Hargreeves.”

“‘Sup?” Klaus said and with great reluctance sat up from his comfortable position on the ground.

“I do wish you would stop coming here, my stupid child.” Her voice sounded disappointed, as usual, with a hint of sadness buried deep.

“You and me both sister.”

“I am not your sister. I’m more like your unenthusiastic creator.”

“Soooooooo basically my Mom then.”

Her look of complete and utter disgust forced out a genuine laugh from Klaus. “No! Certainly not.”

“You are,” he sing-songed. “You’re my mo~om.”

She sighed. “You are exhausting.” This child of Hers truly tested Her patience.

“And don’t I know it!” He sat criss-cross and looked over at the little girl standing on the trail a few yards away. Since he was finally sitting up and shaking off the lingering bad effects of dying- it was like an uncomfortable aura clinging to his skin- She walked over to where he had appeared.

She gave him a pitying look. “You can’t stay here, you know.”

Klaus looked up at Her. “I know, but a few minutes couldn’t hurt, could it?”

She looked up at the trees and thought for a moment. “I suppose not. Your body needs time to repair and your soul’s connection to your body has increased in strength over the years- a direct result of your excessive number of deaths,” She said pointedly.

“Yeah,” he sighed. This was nothing he didn’t already know.

“Though this time was different, now wasn’t it?” She looked down at him and decided to sit primly across from her lost child. He has lived a much harder life than he was meant to and She thought that he deserved a brief respite and whatever small comfort Her presence could provide him before She had to send him back.

“Yeah, yeah it was. It wasn’t dear ‘ol daddy this time.”

“Oh?” She knew what had happened already, of course. A perk of being omniscient. But Klaus liked to talk and it had the added benefit of distracting him from whatever horrid and painful death he had just experienced.

He hummed yes and nodded. “This time it was all on me. I was trying to save Ben. He was supposed to die today, you know?” She nodded her agreement. “I… I’m honestly not sure if I succeeded or not, but I was trying to help him calm down so he could call the Horror back.” He gulped. What if Ben was dead? What if all of this was for nothing and he went back only to find Ben was a ghost again?

Or worse, what if he had decided to move on this time and he was all alone? What if when they go back to the future Klaus was by himself? He’d be back on the streets, but this time without his best friend.

“-aus! Klaus! Calm down.” The little girl’s voice broke through his thoughts and he saw Her for the first time in several minutes. “Calm down.” He was hyperventilating and he needed to calm down- She wasn’t any good with emotional humans.

He took in a deep breath and held it for a moment before letting it out. He didn’t need to breathe here, but the familiarity of the action was comforting.

“You know,” he began, “what would really help me calm down was if I could see a certain someone, a certain soldier who is very calming- the things he can do to me with his tongue.” He groaned and gave Her a mischievous look that She returned with one of revulsion. “Very relaxing.”

This child of Hers really was obnoxious. “You know I can’t do that, Klaus,” She said indulgently.

“I know, but I had to try didn’t I?”

“I suppose you felt you must.”

They shared a knowing smile. He wasn’t all bad all the time. “But it really is time now Klaus. We can’t delay any longer or you might return as a ghost instead.”

The smile dropped from his face. It really wasn’t terrible here and he wouldn’t mind resting another few minutes.

“If it’s any consolation, Ben isn’t here.” She carefully hid the pleasure She felt telling him this behind Her normal unamused expression.

“He isn’t?” God shook Her head. The smile that erupted on Klaus's face could have outshone the stars if given the chance. “Well, what are you waiting for then? I have a brother to see!”

With a snap of Her fingers, Klaus was gone.

She was growing fond of this annoying creation of Hers, almost enough to where She was looking forward to his eventual permanent stay.

(In 60 or 70 years, of course. She wasn’t a masochist.)

***

Somewhere along the line Luther notified Reginald of what had happened on the mission. His response was an uninterested “acknowledged” said without looking up from his work. Luther decided to keep his response to himself, for the sake of his siblings, while he kept mulling over the interaction he’d just had. He knew Klaus and Reginald had never exactly gotten along but how could he just not care?

Even Ben’s death the first go round had garnered more of a response, even if all he had to say was a blasé remark on the inconvenience of it. They would have to let the press know, after all.

***

Time passed like molasses, each minute clinging to the present and refusing to relinquish its tenuous hold until forced out by the next minute stalwartly pushing forward, much to the displeasure of the remaining members of the Academy. Time could stop right now for all they cared.

Finally, two hours and 19 minutes after Klaus died for the upteenth time, he took a deep and rattling breath, startling everyone in the room out of their private thoughts and drawing all eyes towards him.

A rattling cough echoed across the room as the siblings sat with wide eyes and open mouths, staring and Klaus, whose arm had moved to cover his cough. The thoughts passing through their minds were, for once, the same: how could this happen and what were they going to do now?

Mom was at Klaus’s side almost immediately, placing a comforting hand on his shoulder and checking his vitals- all normal by some miracle (or, rather, through some strange act of magic or science that enabled 43 children to be born at the same exact moment with superpowers, or maybe it was just God).

“‘Ow l’ng wassit th’s t’me?”

“Hush now, darling. You need to rest,” Grace said, gently thwarting Klaus’s attempts to sit up. Klaus hummed his acknowledgment and was asleep almost immediately.

Ben, finally unfrozen from his shock at seeing his brother alive again, walked to Klaus’s side in a daze and reached out a trembling hand and touched his chest, which was rising and falling like some sort of miracle. The rest of the siblings shortly followed, with Luther heading up the rear.

How? Just how? He was dead, they were sure of it, but here he was, breathing on his own with a heartbeat and everything. The monitors blinking and beeping nearby proved it.

“Mom?” Diego asked. The what the fuck was left unsaid.

“Yes, dear?”

“How…?”

“How what, dear? You need to finish the question, silly, if you want me to be able to answer it,” Grace said with her ever-pleasant smile. She had finished checking Klaus’s vitals and had joined the circle that had manifested around the bed.

Five interrupted before anyone else could jump in. “What he means is how is this possible? Klaus was dead, Mom. People don’t just come back to life after being dead for hours.” His face was expressionless, but his eyes were radiating anger. He wanted answers and damn anyone who stood in his way of getting them. One of his brothers had gotten hurt and that was on him. This wasn’t supposed to happen.

“I’m afraid you’ll have to ask your father about that children. He was very clear that I was not to tell you.”

“Tell us what Mom?” Allison broke in, her voice betraying her frustrations. “You haven’t told us anything.”

Grace paused for a moment that felt like an eternity. “How about I make everyone some cookies? I’m sure Klaus would enjoy some when he’s feeling better. Be sure not to stress him out too much- he needs time to recover- and try not to wake him up.” With that she turned and left.

“What was that?” Diego screeched. “What the- wha’- just what?”

“He’s alive,” Ben said. “That’s all that matters right now. He’s okay.” Ben’s hand still had not left the spot where the tentacle had ripped a hole in Klaus’s chest. His other hand gripped Klaus’s wrist, fingers hovering over his pulse. The monitors claimed he was alive but Ben really couldn’t be sure. This was just all too much.

“Uh, Ben, you okay there buddy?” Luther asked. “You’re breathing kind of heavy.”

“I’m fine,” Ben gritted out. His voice was trained, pulled taut like an over-stretched rope hammock on the verge of snapping. Perhaps the hammock had Luther sitting in it.

Diego huffed. “Of course you aren’t. None of us are. Klaus just died and now he’s here breathing and perfectly fine!”

“Maybe Mom managed to fix him?” Vanya ventured, but she didn’t sound convincing, even to herself.

“No. Remember our first aid training? You can only revive someone up to ten minutes after death,” Luther said.

Allison hummed. “But what if Mom injected him with something like what happened to you Luther?”

“No, we would have seen it and Klaus still looks normal,” Diego disagreed. “No offense, Luther,” he added as an afterthought.

Luther hummed disapprovingly but didn’t make a rejoinder.

“No” Five interjected. “This must be some new aspect of his powers. It’s the only thing that makes sense.”

“That… actually makes a lot of sense,” Diego said. Allison nodded her agreement.

“You know,” Ben began, “back when Klaus and I were on the street. He would get really high or drunk sometimes.” Luther snorted but was cut off by a sharp jab in the gut by Allison’s elbow. Ben glared at them. Couldn’t Luther stop for just one minute? He turned to Klaus- still sleeping soundly, he confirmed.

“Anyways, sometimes he would get the dosing wrong and he would OD.”

Diego nodded. He was familiar with Klaus’s overdoses. He was his emergency contact and had spent many sleepless nights in hospital rooms waiting and hoping for his little brother to wake up.

“And… and sometimes he would take too much and-” Ben took a deep breath. “And sometimes no one would find him and I was always so worried that he would… you know. But he never did. He should have so many times, but he never did. And now, now I’m wondering if maybe some of those times… he really truly did. But he came back?” Ben’s voice had grown softer as he had gone on. It really was too much to think about for long, how his brother could have died in the past with him right next to him and he never even knew.

They passed long minutes without talking, which was a marvel in this house. There was so much about Klaus that they never knew.

Eventually Vanya broke the silence that had descended on the group. “It’s late.”

There was a chorus of questioning hums and odd looks. “It’s almost 3am and Klaus clearly isn’t waking up soon and we all need some sleep so we can process this.”

Ben’s head shot up. “What? No! I’m not leaving him.”

“Me neither,” Diego said. “We need to be there for him this time. Clearly we’ve been slacking.”

“Diego’s right. Part of our time here was to focus on learning to act like a real family,” Five stated.

“And that involves staying when there’s a medical emergency,” Allison finished. They couldn’t believe she was suggesting that they leave him.

“Wait, wait! That’s not what I said, if you’ll just listen to me,” Vanya protested. “I’m not saying we all leave, but we could take shifts. We really do need the rest.”

Five agreed after a considering look. “She’s right. We’re no good to him dead on our feet.”

“I... you have a point, Vanya. Sorry for jumping on you like that. It’s been a long day and I think we’re all a little too fried,” Allison said with a sheepish look.

“Thank you,” Vanya replied with a smile.

“Yeah,” Diego added and Luther nodded.

“”I’m not leaving him,” Ben interjected sternly.

“You need to sleep though,” Vanya said.

“No. I’m not leaving. He wouldn’t if it were me.”

“But, Ben-” Vanya started, but paused when Allison put her hand on her shoulder.

“What about a compromise? We move one of the other hospital beds over here, close enough to where you can still hold his hand, and you sleep there?”

Ben thought for a moment. “That could work,” he said with a sigh.

“Luther, why don’t you push the bed over here?”

“Sure,” he said, walking over to pull it over.

“Okay, Ben,” Allison began. “I’m sure you’ll want first shift so we’ll leave you to it. We’ll swap every hour. Sound good?”

A chorus of yes’s and that’s fine’s greeted her.

With that they hammered out a cycling schedule of who was going to stay up with Klaus and when. Everyone reluctantly moved off to their separate bedrooms (except Allison and Vanya who both went back to Allison’s room- Vanya needed a better explanation as to what had happened) and fell into fitful sleeps.

Ben remained where he was, not moving except to check the heart monitors every couple of minutes to make sure he wasn’t imagining Klaus’s pulse.

At some point Mom dropped off cookies and rechecked Klaus’s lines, but Ben barely registered her appearance.

***

Diego walked back into the infirmary at 4am not having slept at all. He was immediately greeted with the sight of Ben’s silhouette that didn’t look like it had moved once in the past hour. He sighed softly. This really sucked.

He walked over to where Ben was sat and laid a hand on his shoulder. “You should go to bed,” he said softly.”

“Yeah, I know.” Ben sounded like he had been crying. It was hard to tell in the poor lightning, but after a careful and (hopefully) subtle inspection Diego thought he saw that Ben’s eyes were red.

“Go do that then,” Diego said, giving Ben a light shove. Ben huffed and turned to face Diego. Yeah, Diego thought, he was definitely crying earlier.

Ben turned back to face Klaus. “I should.”

“Then why don’t you?” There wasn’t an extra chair nearby so Diego leaned on the bed that was set nearby for Ben’s use. The sheets didn’t even look ruffled.

“I just…” He trailed off.

“You just?”

“Look, I’m just scared, okay?” Ben’s voice was steely, but anxious. “What if I go to sleep and he dies again? What if something happens? Like when Hazel and Cha-Cha broke in? I- I couldn’t live with myself if something happened and I wasn’t there. I need to be here when he wakes up,” Ben choked out, his voice breaking as he finished.

“I get it. I really do. You’ve always been there for each other and then something like this happens, but you’re no good to him if you’re too tired to function.” It was the same speech Diego had given to himself over and over while he was tossing and turning in bed, waiting impatiently for his turn to visit with Klaus.

“Don’t you think I know that!”

“I know you do,” Diego said softly. They both sat, watching the steady rise and fall of Klaus's breaths. Even though he knew Mom said Klaus was fine and would continue to be fine, he and Ben both needed the visual reminder.

Neither moved until Allison came in an hour later and forced them both into the extra hospital bed to sleep.

***

Morning found them all forced into the dining room by an over-worried chimpanzee and doting mother. Apparently, the miraculous death and revival of one of their own did not mean they were excused from breakfast.

The group muddled in at 7:55, having been forced from their various beds and nooks and bedside vigils to stand behind their chairs, waiting for Sir Reginald Hargreeves to grace them with his presence so they could hurry and eat so they could regroup. Unfortunately, none of them could leave until the endlessly-slow Reginald finished his meal and dismissed them.

Just as the clock struck eight o’clock, Hargreeves walked in and stood behind his own chair. He inspected his Academy for a moment, ensuring everything was in order. There was One, Two, Three… Four was missing from his place. That simply would not do.

“Grace!” he called.

“Yes sir?” She asked with a smile.

“Where is Number Four?”

“He’s still in the infirmary, Mr. Hargreeves, sleeping off his injuries.”

“He’s had enough sleep I dare say,” he huffed. “Bring him here at once. There is no excuse for tardiness or sloth. I will not stand for it in my house.”

“Yes sir,” Grace said with a tone bordering on disapproval, not that Sir Hargreeves would notice such a thing. Nor would he ever expect it- such emotions were not in her programming.

They stood in uncomfortable silence (for everyone but Reginald) waiting for Mom to appear with Number Four in tow. Or not. She was told to but it seemed to them that he was still in too rough of condition to come to breakfast, not that Hargreeves cared.

Five, as always, was the brave one. “What happened to Klaus?”

“No talking during meals, Five. You know this.” Was the quick and sharp retort.

“If we’re being technical here, sir, breakfast hasn’t started yet. We’re waiting on Klaus. Hey! Speaking of, what happened to him.”

Hargreeves stared down Number Five who started back with a ferocity that Hargreeves had yet to see out of him, the very same fierceness that enabled him to survive in the apocalypse by himself for 40+ years, find a way back, and nearly perfect his ability to time travel.

The tenseness in the room could have suffocated lesser men with how it permeated the air and filled every little space. Both men refused to buckle first; hell could come and fire could rain down on the house, but neither would look away. To do so would belay weakness and that was something you dare not show in this house. Hargreeves could not lose his authority to his seventeen (59) year old ward and Five wouldn’t back down to this pathetic excuse of a father and a person.

Fortunately for the breakables in the room Grace chose that moment to show up with a tired but healthy-looking Number Four trailing behind her. She took her place beside the food cart and Four walked to his chair without a glance at any of his siblings. It seemed he was having his own staring contest with the floor.

“You may sit.”

Breakfast passed slowly with Herr Who-Gives-a-Fuck prattling on about something do to with chemistry in the background and each sibling trying and failing to make eye contact with Klaus, who still seemed determined to continue his starting contest with the floor, even though there was now a table in the way.

No matter, Ben thought. They were going to discuss this one way or another.

 

***

They were ushered off to group training while Klaus went back to the infirmary for observation. They overheard Reginald say that Klaus’s individual training would resume in three days and that was enough to set most of the Academy on edge.

It wasn’t until after dinner that they were able to sneak away from their hovering guardians and taskmasters. Not bothering to knock- privacy was an illusion here- they stormed into the infirmary where Klaus had spent the day dozing and recovering from, well, his recovery. Resurrections and healing fatal would took a lot of energy Klaus had noticed.

“Klaus!” Ben exclaimed and dashed over to his brother’s bed, wrapping him in a tight hug and refusing to let go until after Diego had bounded over and joined the hug, pulling them all together. They each took turns giving Klaus a warm hug, even Luther and Five. Vanya had kissed him on the cheek, drawing out a genuine smile.

“Well, isn’t this a warm greeting!” Klaus saidcheerfully. “All of this fuss for lil ‘ol me?” he said with a faux southern accent.

“Don’t get too excited. Anyone else would have gotten a party. You’re lucky we even showed up,” Diego snarked.

“And don’t I know it!” Klaus laughed. “Any word on when Mom is letting me leave, by the way? I’m feeling hunky-dory and oh so bored,” he said, dramatically pressing his wrist to his forehead and falling back in bed in an imitation of some old victorian damsel who was weak with consumption.

Everyone’s smile dropped. “Klaus… you were dead,” Ben said

Klaus peaked an eye at him. The mood in the room had suddenly dropped to downright depressing. “Hmmm. Yeah. Happens sometimes. I got better though so no harm, no foul, right?” His grin was wide in an attempt to soothe their apparent worries. Why did they have to find out now? Why couldn’t this have happened in a few months when they were in their proper timelines and Reggie wasn’t looming down his and everyone else’s backs.

“No harm, no foul? No harm, no foul?” Ben said incredulously. “Klaus! You died! Because of me?”

“Better me than you Benny.”

“No! No it isn’t! And- and, Klaus, you knew! You knew you wouldn’t stay dead and, and, and you didn’t tell us!” He sputtered. “We were so worried that you were dead and Klaus I don’t think I could survive losing you.”

Klaus really wasn’t equipped to deal with a sad and distraught Ben, nevermind a sad and distraught anyone else, especially not while so terribly sober. Mom would barely give him tylenol.

“I’m sorry, Ben. Really, I am. I promise I didn’t mean to die but if it comes down to me or you, I’m always going to pick me.” He gave everyone a weak smile. “After all, and here’s the important bit, I get better.”

“And when did you find that out?” Diego asked.

“Uhhh, well you know. Just sort of realized. No biggie.”

“Nope. Try again,” Allison said. With a sweeping look at his siblings Klaus realized that they really were going to Discuss™ this so he might as well make it easier on himself and go with it so he could go back to sleep. Nice, Klaus thought. Discussing things- what a healthy mindset and a thing a stable person would do! My hypothetical therapist would be so proud.

“Sort of figured it out after the fifth untreated overdose I woke up from.” Ben made a strangled noise from somewhere off to the side and Vanya was wearing an expression of horror. The rest of them didn’t look very surprised. Truthfully, it wasn’t that big of a revelation. It was beginning to look like Five’s theory was right.

“But I, uh, really figured it out at the rave when Luther was shacking up with that girl who was into furries and her boyfriend was uber jealous. I might have jumped on him and he might have thrown me on the ground and I might have, uh, well, hit my head. And, long story short, I met God, squared up with Dad, and got booted right on out of Heaven. And She’s been booting me out every time since then.

“Wait? The rave?” Luther asked, startled. “You died at the rave?”

“Uh, yeah, buddy. I kinda thought you knew.”

“What? No! I- I would never,” he sputtered. “You died and you thought I left you there on purpose?” The astonishment and surprise was clear in Luther’s voice.

Klaus shrugged and Diego’s fists were clenched. How dare he?

“Yeah and when we first got here and you threw me against the wall.” He really thought Luther knew this. Did that formula give him the brain of a monkey too (no offense Pogo). That couldn’t be it though- he hadn’t been given it yet in this timeline. Beefy dudes just must not have too many brain cells. It was one of their major pros when sleeping with them, but it was also super annoying when it was his own brother being an idiot.

“Again?” Ben seethed. The time during apocalypse was bad enough, but Luther went and did it again. Ben really was going to kill him.

“Again?” Vanya echoed as Diego threw himself full force at Luther. That bastard!

Luther was knocked to the floor as Diego began a barrage of fists. How dare he get Klaus killed! How dare he leave him there! And, most of all, how dare he do it a second time!

“-iego! Diego, stop!” Diego could feel hands pulling at him but he didn’t care. The bastard deserved this and worse. He acted all high and mighty about being Number One, their “leader” and then he abandons his men! His family. He was vaguely aware of the clamor of voices around him, but he was only focused on the one in front of him.

“I’m sorry! I’m so so sorry! I didn’t mean to! I didn’t know,” he was crying. The bastard wasn’t even fighting back.

“I heard a rumor that you stopped fighting!”

Diego felt his resolve weaken as he lowered his fists. “Fuck you Allison.” He took a deep breath and stood up and walked a few feet away, teeth still clenched.

Luther remained where he was on the floor, tears still leaking from his eyes. Klaus didn’t think he’d ever seen Luther cry before and, fuck, if he didn’t feel guilty as fuck about it. He really should have kept his trap up.

Allison hurried over to Luther’s side, tugging him to a sitting position and prodding at his bruises and various minor cuts. None of them needed any attention, fortunately.

Luther turned to Klaus. “Klaus, I am so sorry. I swear I didn’t know. I didn’t mean to, oh God. I killed my brother,” he choked out. Klaus wasn’t sure how much more of this he could take. He climbed out of his bed and walked over to where he was sitting, pulling Ben, who had yet to let go of his hand, along with him.

Sitting next to Luther, he put a tentative hand on his shoulder. “It’s alright, really. I know you didn’t mean to big guy. I think you just forget your strength and that I’m kind of a bean pole.”

“Kind of,” Vanya snarked, joining in on Klaus’s attempt to lighten the mood.

“I’ll do better Klaus. I swear I will. I’ve been such a shitty big brother to you.”

“Well” Klaus chirped. “It would be kinda hard to do worse at this point. Just no more throwing me, yeah?” Between Klaus’s forgiving smile and comforting hand Luther allowed himself to huff out a laugh at the joke/taunt.

“And if you don’t, Number One, I have a special knife with your name on it,” Diego added darkly.

“Diego!” Allison scolded.

“No, no.” Luther said. “He’s right. I’d deserve it. I still feel like I deserve it now to be honest.”

“Hey,” Vanya butted in. “Remember when we had the whole talk about you crushing me and throwing me in the vault? Don’t make it about you right now. Right now it’s about Klaus and I’m starting to think we should have made it about Klaus long before now.”

There were several nods of agreement. Vanya had always been the most sensible one, not that they listened to her most of the time.

“Yeah. You’re right.” Luther turned to face Klaus. “I’m sorry Klaus. I’m sorry for making this about me, for leading you to the rave when you were trying to get clean (even Luther had accepted that Klaus was finally sober at this point), for letting someone kill you, for not noticing, for accidentally-” he took a deep breath- “-for killing you, and for ignoring you all this time.”

Klaus sat stunned. He never would have expected this out of Luther and, honestly, he was more than a bit speechless. “I… thank you. I can’t say that I entirely forgive you or that I’m always comfortable around you.” Luther looked heartbroken at this. “But I accept your apology on the condition that you try to do better.” He looked at Luther expectantly and, for the first time since they were kids for real, he actually expected Luther to agree with him.

“Of course, Klaus. You’re right. I’ve been really shitty to you and I’m going to do better,” he finished with a firm nod.

Klaus’s smile could light up even the mausoleum at that point. “Apology accepted then!” He made to stand up. “So we good everyone? Mystery solved? Case closed? Ready to go back to bed?”

“Not so fast,” Five said. “How did Dad know about your ability to resurrect?”

“Geez that word makes me sound like fuckin’ Jesus or something. I am far too gay and pretty to be Jesus.”

“You’re gay?” Luther asked. Oh this lovable idiot, Klaus thought.

Everyone gave him a look that clearly said uh, duh?

“Don’t let him derail this,” Five interjected. “How did he know, Klaus?”

“Does it matter?”

A resounding yes was heard from the other six members of the Academy. Ben squeezed his hand. “Please? For me? No more secrets, just like before.”

Damn those puppy dog eyes, Klaus thought. There were going to be the end of him- not literally though, he hoped. “Pogo found me after the whole thing with Luther and was there when I, well, when I woke up?”

“Holy shit,” Diego said, having finally calmed down enough to listen to what Klaus was saying. “I bet that was not what you were hoping to wake up to,” he said with an attempt at a smile and a joke.

“I know, right? I was hoping for Mr. Tall, Dark, and Handsome with a twenty carat diamond ring and some tylenol because that shit hurts,” Klaus laughed.

“Someone’s aiming high,” Vanya teased.

Allison was laughing too. “Let’s make a deal. I’ll get you your twenty carat ring if you promise not to go and die on us again, okay?

Klaus smiled. He really did love his family sometimes, even if they were intolerable little shits most of the time. “Would if I could sis, but no can do. Dear ‘ol Dad has another training session lined up for me on Thursday,” he laughed.

You could get whiplash from how fast the amused chuckles stopped and the horrified looks began. Did he mean what they thought he meant?

“What do you mean by that?” Five demanded as Klaus was beginning to realize his mistake. Fuck. He did not mean to say that. Stupid mother-henning siblings.

“Nothing, nothing! You know me, just talking out both sides of my ass as usual. Anyways, did anyone see where Ben hid the cookies Mom made? No? Well, then, if you’ll excuse me I’ll just go find Mom and get her to make more because someone- looking at you Ben- is stingy with the sugar.” Throughout his rambling his was trying to detach his hand from Ben’s and get out the door. Vanya had surreptitiously moved in front of it, however, and Luther was now standing as well.

“What did you mean, Klaus,” Ben asked in a breathless monotone. “And please don’t tell me it’s what we’re all thinking.”

“No! Not at all! Pshh.”

“Then what did you mean,” Ben demanded again, his voice rising. “Please. I’m begging you. Look me in the eyes right now and tell me Dad didn’t realize you could come back from the dead and decide to keep testing it.”

“...no?”

“Oh my God,” Allison said, putting her hand to her mouth. This was too much.

“It’s fine, guys! Really! He just wanted to know what I could come back from and how quickly I could come back. That sort of thing. No big deal. Ben, Benny, please stop crying. Vanya, you too. It’s fine! I’m fine.”

“How long,” Diego demanded. “How… how long has this been going on?”

“That fight happened the first week we got here,” Luther said, voice hollow.

Diego saw red. “Are you telling me that whenever you had all those “individual training sessions” you were here, being murdered by our own father?”

“No! No, of course not. Just… just most of them?”

“I’m going to kill him,” Five said.

“Not if I get to him first,” Diego growled.

“Please, I’ll just rumor him paralyzed and then we all can have our way with him.”

“We can’t kill him!” Luther exclaimed, ever the loyal son. He may love his siblings but some things are just too ingrained to change. “He’s our dad.”

Ben’s grip on Klaus’s hand tightened. “And he murdered our brother. Repeatedly”

Luther took a deep breath. “Yeah, yeah he did,” he agreed softly, seemingly still in shock.

Klaus snorted. They were all being ridiculous about this. It really wasn’t that big of a deal. He ended each session a little emotionally scarred, but, hey, that’s par for the course when you’re a member of the Umbrella Academy. But physically he was no worse for wear. “How is this really any different from any of our other training?”

“He killed you!” Diego exclaimed.

“He killed Ben too,” Klaus said incredulously. “The first time.”

“That’s different and you know it,” Ben said.

“Oh? Do enlighten me.”

“That wasn’t on purpose- it was just a mission gone wrong. This? This was pure sadistic murder! Torture! I mean, Klaus, he literally killed you- with his own hands! What kind of monster does something like that?”

“I don't know.” He shrugged. “I mean, it wasn’t so bad. It wasn’t fun by any means. The “exsanguination trials” were pretty miserable. And there’s a hundred dollar word for you. But, I don’t know. Death just has never seemed very scary or, well, permanent to me. So I guess it just bothers me less.” He shrugged again.

Why wouldn’t they all just let this go? He was tired and this was a really lousy moment for them to all suddenly start to care about his well-being. “I deal with death intimately every day. We’re practically buddies at this point. This seemed like more of a natural extension of our acquaintanceship than anything else.”

There was a moment of silence, long enough that Klaus began shuffling back and forth, uncomfortable with the six pairs of eyes that were all too focused on him.

“What?” He snapped, getting frustrated with this whole ordeal.

“You can’t really be okay with this Klaus,” Vanya said softly, voice tender and coaxing, like how one would speak to startled and hurt kitten.

“Well, no. not exactly. But you guys needed someone to keep Reggie’s attention while you trained Vanya and, let’s be honest here, I’m not good for much else besides keeping lookout and drawing attention to myself. So, I decided to play to my strengths and keep him off your back.”

“You mean you did this on purpose?” Five asked

“No! Of course not! But when it happened I just sorta went along with it. It seemed in everybody’s best interest.”

“But not yours, Klaus,” Vanya said. “You have to know I would never have asked you to do something like this for me, not even at my very worst.”

He smiled tenderly at her. “I know V. But I’ve always been such a burden on everyone, especially you Diego and you too Ben, and I realized that I needed to step up, be a real part of the family and actually help out and stop joking around about everything.”

“But you do! Don’t you realize that?” Vanya pleaded.

“She’s right,” Ben interjected.

“You’re the most important part of the team!” Klaus snorted. “No, stop that! You’re the reason this place isn’t a complete black hole of depression. Despite how annoyed we all get at your antics and jokes, if you didn’t do them we’d fall apart. You cheer us all up and are there when we’re sad or upset. You notice. You notice when one of us isn’t doing okay and you do something about it! You plan a day at the mall.”

“A trip to Griddy’s,” Ben interjected.

“You sneak us all ice cream,” Vanya continued.

“You make us laugh,” Diego added. Allison and Luther nodded.

“You’re the reason any of us have any fond memories of this place,” Five said.

“Exactly!” Vanya exclaimed. “Never downplay how important happiness is to a person and how grateful we are for you to try and keep the mood up. We haven’t done a very good job at letting you know how important you are, have we?”

Klaus looked close to tears and as he took in a shuttered breath a few fell. Ben quickly reached up to wipe them away and pulled Klaus into a tight hug. “We love you Klaus.”

“I guess I Iove you idiots too.”

As if by some unspoken agreement the siblings formed a giant hug with Klaus in the middle (though Five tried to teleport away but relented at Vanya’s sharp glare).

“Don’t you think for a second though that we’re through discussing this,” Ben whispered into Klaus’s ear. “Tomorrow you’re going to tell us everything he did to you and we’re going to figure out a way to stop all of this without messing up the timeline.”

Five froze. “Uh, is this a good time to mention that I figured out the formula four days ago?”

The group broke apart and turned to face Five with equally angry and bewildered expressions.

“What! Why didn’t you tell us! You little shit!” Everyone’s voice overlapped as they all spoke over each other trying to make sure that Five knew that he definitely should have told them four days ago.

“I didn’t think this would happen!” Five exclaimed. He turned an accusing look towards all of them. “And would you have rather not found out about this at all? Hmmm?”

“Kind of,” Klaus said. Ben hushed him.

“Well. What are we waiting for then?” Allison asked with a hesitant smile. “Let’s go home.”

“Let’s go home,” Five echoed with a nod. “Unless anyone would like to stay?” They all glared and he chuckled. “Guess not. Alright everyone make a circle and hold hands like we’re a buncha hippies!”

“Hey! Don’t diss hippies! I like their style,” Klaus said.

Vanya smiled. “And don’t we all know it,” she teased, remembering his various floral skirts that he had stolen from Allison.

They shuffled around a bit until they were in an oval-shaped circle. Klaus was sequestered between Ben and Diego, feeling for once in his life that his entire family just might actually love him. Fuckers.

He wasn’t going to say it back though. He had a reputation to keep.

No he didn’t.

“I love you guys,” he said as they disappeared in a flash of blue.

Notes:

A cheesy ending I know, but nothing else seemed to work. Please let me know if you guys want a sequel dealing with the fallout of all this. (I make no promises, though)

Also, don't worry. Klaus eventually gets to see Dave!

I live off comments and kudos!

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 1 of I am not there, I do not sleep