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Chapter Text

Klaus Hargreeves is twenty-six, most definitely coming down from his latest high, and completely out of money when a man comes stumbling quite literally out of thin air into the alley Klaus is currently wandering through and hits the ground hard at Klaus’ feet. This is surprising in that it is both a completely unexpected occurrence and quite familiar to a man that grew up in a house with a boy that liked to pull the same trick ALL THE TIME.

Now, normally Klaus would mind his own business and go about his day, however the man was currently quite unconscious, possible dead actually, and carrying an expensive looking briefcase.

Therefore- with the reasoning of any reasonably gray-moralled person that has ever walked by something that was most certainly not legal, but also not their problem- Klaus picked up the briefcase and went about his day.

Twenty-three minutes from the moment Klaus picked up this case he would open it and find himself surprising a group of men in army uniforms half a century earlier than when he had opened up the case.

Twenty-four minutes after Klaus picked up the case a very aggravated women would storm into an alleyway only to find her employee quite dead and missing a rather important piece of property.

Thirty-five minutes after Klaus picked up the case a certain time-traveling assassin would quietly hope to meet whomever it was that had aggravated his superior so much as he watched he storm past him over a cup of hot coffee.

Five hours, eighteen minutes and precisely thirty-three seconds after Klaus had picked up two men in army uniforms will appear exactly where Klaus had opened this case earlier that day- both looking quite surprised at the sudden change in scenery. Both were also tangled quite closer than most passerbys would approve of and had to quite quickly re-adjust exactly where certain articles of clothing were.

Luckily no one was currently interested in wandering down random alleyways at this time of the day. Both men agreed that it would probably be best to leave the briefcase in that alleyway and concern themselves with more pressing concerns.

Seven hours and fifteen minutes after Klaus picked up the case a very annoyed Five Hargreeves picked up the missing case, a matching one in his hand, and hoped that whatever idiot had opened it hadn’t managed to muck up time too badly.

As it were Klaus and Dave would be recorded dead upon not returning from an area that had been quite torn to pieces not four hours after they left. As such, time remained unchanged. After all, what was one little change?

Far away a little girl laughed at all this nonsense and just slightly altered a certain set of files. Best to keep that man where he was for as long as she could.

-

Two years later Klaus nervously stood in front of the gym he knew his brother was currently living in. While Klaus had not spoken to Diego in years, he had something very important to ask him.

“Diego!” Klaus exclaimed happily as he swayed down the steps of the boiler room and ignored the knives embedding themselves into the wall above his head. “So grand to see you!”

“Klaus, what the hell are you doing here?” Diego grumbled unhappily.

As fate would have it Diego had only just gotten to sleep when Klaus had bounced in after a particularly distressing night. That is to say, he was currently in a terrible mood.

“Well, I’ve come with excellent news brother dear!” Klaus said happily.

“No.” Diego sighed. “No, I don’t want anything to do with whatever you’ve gotten yourself into this time.”

“Er,” Klaus blinked, loosing some of the cheerful skip in his step.

“It’s not anything to do with drugs if that’s what your thinking!” Klaus joked nervously.

“Sure.” Diego sighed, again- what was it with these brooding types always sighing all the time?

“Honest.” Klaus said with a smile. “It’s great, I’m-”

“Leaving.” Diego interrupted.

“Pardon?” Klaus blinked.

“You’re leaving, right now.” Diego said, ushering Klaus out his door. “I’m not in the mood right now for your nonsense, I just want to get some sleep.”

“But,” Klaus began.

“Bother me later Klaus, just leave me alone for the moment, yeah?” Diego groaned, closing the door in his brother’s face.

“But… but I’m getting married.” Klaus whispered to the suspiciously red-tented door.

After an extended nap and several cups of coffee Diego would wince at his behavior and set out to call his brother and apologize, however he had no idea if Klaus even had a phone let alone what that number could be. Tracking Klaus down also proved pointless.

Diego would not see or hear from Klaus for several years- at a funeral.

-

Klaus’ call to Allison went impossibly, mindbogglingly, worse than the visit to Diego’s. It also was a very short phone call.

“Sister dear, I have excellent news!” Klaus announced cheerfully into the phone.

“I don’t have time for this.” Was the very short reply before a ringing noise announced that she had hung up.

Klaus was having terrible luck with his timing.

-

Luther was on the moon, he’d evidently been for a few years according to Pogo and, well Klaus had hung up early this time.

-

Vanya had a lovely little apartment and Klaus was dead-set on having this time go well. How the hell he managed to show up just as someone tripped down the stairs right onto him and manage to break his fingers- then leading to a trip that should have been much shorter given the amount of time it took to bandage him up with his insistent fiancee at his side… well Klaus took the hint.

-

Ben agreed to write the best man’s speech for Klaus at least, even if it was a bit difficult to keep him fully summoned for long enough to do it.

-

It was a small ceremony, with only a single family member present- one who wasn’t actually even alive- and a small group of friend’s and coworkers. (Upon their abrupt arrival to the future Dave had panicked and went out to find a job, one year and a lot of night classes and debt later he was running a small business and selling quite a lot of cakes- they were just like my grandma’s someone had commented.)

The size of the crowd however didn’t make it any less of a cheerful event, the day was the perfect temperature and there were just the right amount of clouds in the sky. Klaus had never been happier.

Everyone politely ignored the fact that one of the best men was glowing… and slightly see-through, his speech was suitably touching after all.

And the cake was truly quite excellent.

-

Therefore after this was all said and done- when Sir, Reginald Hargreeves died a few years later Klaus was happily living a domestic life above a very popular bakery and had been clean for nearly four years.

Had his siblings known this fact they might have been surprised that out of all of them Klaus was the most well-adjusted and happy with his lot in life.

Unfortunately they were busy with their own problems and upon hearing the news of their dead father only one spared a thought for Klaus.

Diego hoped he’d finally get to apologize. Hopefully Klaus hadn’t been trying to tell him anything too important.

Chapter Text

Luther was on the moon when he got the message.

Diego was doing his best Batman impression.

Allison was on the red carpet.

Klaus was proudly showing his best attempt at frosting to his chuckling husband.

Five was in the future, that tended to numb things a bit.

Ben was standing behind Klaus, rolling his eyes at his ridiculous brother.

Vanya was walking down the side of the street.

They all decided that it’d be best to return to their childhood home.

-

“Did you remember to pack everything.” Dave asked as Klaus set his suitcase on their doorstep.

“Yes love.” Klaus chuckled. “You worry too much, it’s three days away and then you’ll be joining me for the rest of the week.”

“And I’ll be there.” Ben added.

“Thank you Ben.” Dave sighed with a smile at the currently visible ghost.

“Hey!” Klaus exclaimed. “I can take care of myself just fine!”

This was, of course, said with a dramatic flip of his boa-scarf that ended with Klaus nearly tripping over his suitcase.

“Of course dear.” Dave chuckled as Ben laughed behind him and Klaus pouted.

-

“It’s been awhile.” Klaus sighed as he stared up at the gates in front of them.

“I’d be thrilled if it was longer.” Ben said dryly.

“I wouldn’t complain if I didn’t have to be here either.” Klaus sighed as he headed up the steps.

Klaus had got there before anyone but Luther and he had no desire to talk to that particular brother first, so Klaus wandered into Reginald’s office. There wasn’t much of interest there, mostly expensive and pointless trinkets set next to files. Klaus was sitting with the window open flicking through one file in particular- mainly the bit about him and how disappointing his father found him when Luther stormed in.

This was unfortunate for a variety of reasons that all lead back to the fact that Luther storming into the room caused Klaus to promptly and accidentally drop the file out the window and into the garbage below just as a particularly unpleasant person walked by. It’s a shame, a lot of effort could have been saved if Luther had just waited the two minutes it would have taken Klaus to set the file down.

“Klaus.” Luther growled. “What are you doing up here?”

“A bit of light reading.” Klaus smiled innocently at his brother.

“Get out of his office.” Luther demanded.

Klaus rolled his eyes and complied.

-

The family meeting went just great.

“So do you think Luther actually thinks that one of us killed dad?” Ben sighed from his spot on the kitchen counter.

“Hmm, maybe.” Klaus sighed from his spot sprawled out across the table glaring at Reginald’s ashes.

“You don’t have to summon him.” Ben said softly.

“I know.” Klaus frowned.

“He wasn’t murdered, you heard Diego about the coroner's report.” Ben said.

“Yeah, but… would it help them?” Klaus bit his lip. “Or would being able to talk to him just make it worse?”

“With this family? Who the hell knows?” Ben replied honestly.

“Too true!” Klaus laughed brightly.

Any further contemplation was cut short when the room began to shake.

“What the hell?” Ben muttered, jumping down from his perch.

“Well, let’s go see what they’ve done now.” Klaus said brightly, grabbing a fire extinguisher on the way out.

It turned out to be Five, back to looking thirteen and just as arrogant as Klaus remembered. However, it turned out that he was just as observant too.

“Nice dress.” Five commented as he looked up at the assembled siblings.

“Danke.” Klaus grinned.

Then Five looked closer and a look of surprise crossed his face.

“When did you get married?” Five asked curiously.

There were several chocking sounds behind Klaus and Alison of all people replied.

“I’m not married anymore.” She said stiffly.

“I know, you’re not wearing a ring.” Five rolled his eyes. “Therefore I wasn’t taking to you.”

“A little over two years ago.” Klaus replied.

Diego stiffened beside him as if several things had suddenly aligned in his head at once and he was not thrilled with the implications of this new information.

“Sorry about the lack of an invite, but fate was very much against any of you lot coming.” Klaus said dramatically. “I ended up in the ER when I tried to talk to Vanya, never even made it to the door.”

“You tried to invite me?” Vanya asked softly.

“Of course, you’re my sister.” Klaus said bluntly. “I figured I should have some living family there. Ben’s speech was very touching though.”

“It had better been, I worked hard on that.” Ben muttered from where he was curiously hovering over Five.

Klaus laughed at that.

“There’s no need to bring Ben into this.” Luther snapped.

“What are you talking about?” Five frowned. “Why wouldn’t Ben go to his wedding?”

“Klaus can’t see Ben.” Alison said softly, as if breaking bad news.

“When he’s high.” Five rolled his eyes. “And he’s clearly sober. Not even Klaus would show up high on his wedding day.”

“Then you can summon dad!” Luther exclaimed.

“I’m getting coffee.” Five sighed, jumping away.

“Fuck you Luther.” Klaus said bluntly and promptly stormed out of the room.

“Klaus, wait!” Diego shouted after his brother.

“Diego.” Klaus turned to face his brother, both of them now out of the kitchen.

“I wanted to apologize.” Diego said in a rush as if he was afraid if he didn’t spit out the words they would become forever lodged in his throat.

“For what?” Klaus asked, genuinely confused.

“For kicking you out when you were trying to tell me you were getting married.” Diego said.

“Oh, well, like I said, bad timing all around.” Klaus shrugged.

“No, that’s not an excuse.” Diego said. “I should have been there with you, I shouldn’t have thrown you out like that.”

“Diego, it’s okay, it’s okay.” Klaus said, grabbing his brother’s arm. “It’s not the end of the world.”

“It was your wedding, I missed your wedding!” Diego snapped.

“And Alison hung up on me after five seconds.” Klaus said. “Our family is fucked up, what can I say?”

Diego stared at Klaus a moment before laughing, a harsh sound that started at the back of his throat and honestly never really left it.

“Do you want to meet him?” Klaus asked a bit nervously.

“What’s his name?” Diego smiled.

“Dave.” Klaus smiled brightly. “His name is Dave.”

Chapter Text

Klaus was lounging in the back of Diego’s car, waiting outside a crime scene of all things when he heard his brother stumbling… past the car. Klaus glanced up to see that Diego was being escorted away in handcuffs by a very exasperated looking women, clearly a cop, with a surprisingly large grin for someone being arrested. Klaus would know.

Well then. Hopefully lunch tomorrow would still work. Klaus was not one keen on driving, separating the dead from the living at high speeds was just asking for trouble, so Diego’s car would just have to stay where it was. Maybe the lady cop would take pity on his brother and let him go early, they certainly seemed to get along well enough.

Klaus tossed a note in the driver’s seat in case the cop did take pity on him and made sure the door locked behind him, it wouldn’t do for someone to steal all the knives his brother insisted on having in there after all, before walking off. Luckily the bus stop wasn’t too far.

-

Klaus had agreed to help his brother out, but pretending to be his father to access information they had no legal right too was… not going well. Five clearly had no real people skills and defaulting to threatening people was proving to be as successful as paper umbrella in a hurricane. Well, Klaus supposed it was his turn then.

Smashing the snow globe on his head had seemed like a grand idea until he actually did it. Maybe if he was still high it would have dimmed the pain a bit, however new sober Klaus that spent most of his time baking with his husband was no longer used to having bit of glass and whatnot in his hair. And mouth. And face. Yeah, not his best life choice that one. It did get the point across though.

But… the eyeball, which where did he even get that, hadn’t even been made yet. So a dead end. Well, that wasn’t stellar.

“Why is it so important anyways?” Klaus asked as he headed down the steps with his brother several steps ahead of him.

“It belongs to the person that ends the world. Or will belong, time travel, whatever.” Five muttered angrily in reply. “What’s important is now I don’t have a way to identify him!”

“Wait, hold on, go back.” Klaus froze on the steps. “Did you just casually drop that the world is ending?”

“Yes, yes, the apocalypse. Where I got stuck.” Five waved away.

“Uh, no, that’s news to me!” Klaus exclaimed.

The world couldn’t end! If it did then Dave would be… no, there would be no world ending.

“It’s not like you could be much help.” Five hissed in aggravation.

“Okay, you’re upset so I’m going to let that go.” Klaus frowned. “But I’m you’re brother, a lots changed since you’ve last seen me. I could help!”

“Yes, you got married and learned to cook.” Five sighed. “And that’s great, I’m genuinely happy for you, but that doesn’t help me much at the moment. I probably have the Commission after me and have no leads to find this asshole!”

“Alright, what’s the Commission?” Klaus asked.

“Time traveling assassins, I can handle it.” Five waved away.

“Alright then.” Klaus said slowly. “Well, do you know how the world ended then?”

“No.” Five replied in frustration.

“Where it started?” Klaus asked.

Five paused at that.

“Probably the concert hall.” Five said slowly.

“Here?” Klaus asked in surprise.

“Well, that’s where I, where… where you all were.” Five glanced away.

“Oh.” Klaus said. “Oh.”

A cold feeling swept through him as he realized that Five would have been a child. His little brother had found the entire family dead. Shit.

“God Five, I’m so sorry.” Klaus winced.

Five glanced away, looking slightly pained.

“But, but at least that means that the person that lost the eye is probably around here already.” Klaus said. “You could try looking into when that eye would likely be sold and then check hospitals around that date? It was to be before the, um, apocalypse after all.”

Five stared at Klaus a moment before smiling, well his lips twitched so Klaus took it as a win.

“Maybe you’re not as useless as I thought.” Five said.

Then he was gone, scaring the hell out of a poor cab driver across the street.

“Thanks I guess.” Klaus sighed, glancing at his watch.

Well, he’d better get back too- Dave would be quite upset to see him with this much blood at lunch.

-

Diego was late. Not by much, just ten minutes and Klaus knew his brother had been arrested last night and may not be able to come at all… but it was Diego. The first person he wanted to show the ring around his finger to, well other than Ben. But! He didn’t really count given that his ghostly brother had been sitting on the railing next to Klaus when Dave had proposed. (He’d been thrilled and the first to assure Klaus that he wasn’t going to mess this up, if Dave hadn’t run for the hills yet he was quite serious about the whole wedding vows thing.)

However the nervous feeling eased as Diego slid into the chair across from them, still wearing the leather get-up from yesterday.

“Did he even change?” Ben muttered from the chair that looked empty to everyone but Klaus.

“Glad you could make it after your eventful night.” Klaus grinned, fingers nervously tapping his thigh before Dave gently tangled them in his own.

“Ah, so you saw.” Diego coughed, glancing away.

If he was anyone else he might have even blushed.

“Indeed.” Klaus smirked. “You seemed to get along quite well with that cop though. What’s her name?”

“I thought this lunch was about meeting your husband.” Diego said, looking on the brink of actually blushing. “And you haven’t even introduced us.”

“Oh course brother dear.” Klaus chuckled. “Diego, this is Dave- the love of my life. Dave this is my knife-throwing, leather fetish brother with a thing for women with guns evidently.”

“Klaus!” Diego hissed as Dave laughed at his husband’s description.

“A pleasure to meet you.” Dave chuckled, offering his hand.

“The same, given you must be a saint to be married to this one.” Diego agreed, shaking Dave’s hand.

“Hey!” Klaus pouted.

“He’s only joking, dear.” Dave laughed.

Klaus crossed his arms and puffed his cheeks out like a literal five year old as he slumped in his chair.

“What are you, five?” Ben rolled his eyes.

“What are you, five?” Diego unknowingly repeated his brother’s words.

“Of course not, Five is wandering about threatening doctors.” Klaus replied, sitting back up normally.

“I think he’s moved on to whoever makes those prosthetics.” Ben said.

“Didn’t he just get back from the future?” Dave asked curiously. “Why would he care about threatening doctors?”

“That is a topic for after we’ve eaten.” Klaus winced.

Ben hummed in agreement as Dave shrugged it off.

Diego appeared to be biting his tongue to restrain from demanding more information.

“So how did you two meet?” Diego asked instead.

“That’s a hell of a story!” Klaus laughed.

“A bit unbelievable.” Dave agreed.

“It’s Klaus, anything is believable with him.” Diego laughed.

“We met during the Vietnam war.” Klaus said bluntly. “A bit of accidental time travel on my part.”

Diego paused and stared at the blank faces on the pair before slowly nodding.

“Well, alright then.” Diego said. “Weirder things have happened in this family.”

Dave laughed and squeezed Klaus’ hand as the tension eased out of his husband.

“I’d believe it.” Dave grinned.

“Well, I’m glad you found your way back.” Diego smiled.

“Thanks.” Klaus smiled brightly.

“I would have missed all the embarrassing stories I can tell him now.” Diego continued smugly.

“Oh brother, you can try.” Klaus laughed. “I’ve done much worse in front of him!”

“Only you Klaus.” Ben sighed.

Overall, the lunch went quite well.

-

Klaus sighed as he fell into bed several hours later. Everything was going well, Diego liked Dave, Dave was coming to stay tomorrow and his siblings were well, not getting along but only one fist fight had broken out so far so that was a good sign.

There was the concerning matter of the apocalypse apparently on its way, but Klaus was going to ignore that for the moment given how happy he was.

Yes, life was nice.

Klaus picked up his music and headed to take a nice bath, not hearing a window creak open as two figures slid into the house.

Chapter Text

Klaus woke up to darkness and the uncomfortable feeling of having no idea where he was or how he got there. It didn’t take long to figure out the where, a car trunk, however the how was still as evasive as an umbrella in a windstorm.

Klaus remembered having a very nice bath. He remembered returning to his room and sliding a pair of pants on. He remembered planning to pull his headphones off. He didn’t remember actually doing so, even though someone must have as they were no longer there.

They were in fact laying on the floor of his bedroom where Klaus’ head had slammed into the floor several hours earlier.

Klaus did not see this situation ending in anything pleasant for him.

He was in fact, correct.

-

“I have no idea where Five is.” Klaus spat out for the umpteenth time.

The woman in a pink mask seemed to take this truth about as well has she had every other time Klaus had brought it up.

Klaus hissed as she ran the blade over his skin once again, trembling as streams of red dripped down to join the already drying blood coating his chest and dripping into his lap.

“You’re ruining my favorite pair of pants.” Klaus spat angrily.

“Where is Five?” The woman growled angrily at Klaus.

“I have no fucking idea, asshole!” Klaus shouted back. “He isn’t actually thirteen and definitely doesn’t need to check in with any of us! Five goes wherever he wants!”

“I think he’s telling the truth.” The man finally spoke up.

“Thank you.” Klaus growled.

“Where might he be then?” The woman hissed angrily through her teeth.

“Other than the house you yanked me out of? Not a fucking clue.” Klaus replied.

This was only mostly true, but sounded quite convincing.

“He’s useless!” The woman bemoaned angrily. An impressive combination.

“So I’ve been trying to tell you.” Klaus said. “So why don’t you just let-”

Klaus froze as a gun was leveled directly between his eyes.

“On second thought, I make for excellent bait?” Klaus tried hopefully.

The hammer was pulled back as the woman hummed thoughtfully.

“We’d need to know where Five might be to leave a message and if we knew that well, that would be exactly what we needed without you being involved at all.” The woman said.

Klaus had time for one more thought before the woman pulled the trigger.

I’m so sorry, Dave.

-

He woke up to a very washed out world without a drop of color to be seen.

The girl on a bike was not the most… empathetic in Klaus’ opinion.

Still, she did send him on his way eventually. Sir Reginald Hargreeves was just as awful as Klaus had remembered.

At least one mystery was solved, though Klaus didn’t think that Luther would be too pleased with the answer.

-

Klaus woke up the the realization that dying was a hell of a trip.

And he was no longer duck taped to a chair, that was nice. However that definitely sounded like two murders coming back to dump a body.

Klaus took the hint and escaped out the vent with only moments to spare.

Hazel and Cha-Cha were very fucking confused to find the dead body they left behind missing. They didn’t start panicking until they noticed their briefcase was missing too.

-

Klaus was sitting on a bus, definitely getting blood on the back of the seat, when it clicked. He recognized this damn thing. Holy shit, it was the time traveling device that he’d used all those years ago. It was in fact, not the same case Klaus had used years earlier. The chance of that happening was astronomical and far too ridiculous to contemplate. It was however, a case that could be very easily mistaken for that earlier case. They were all made to look the same after all.

Klaus nodded and did not open the case, he’d lucked out the first time and had no interest in falling head first into another way, especially when he was felling like this.

Five however, might be interested.

Now he just had to find him.

-

In the end Klaus had stumbled back into the manor and showered before looking around for mom, evidently still being repaired, then Pogo to get some bandages and something to clean out the cuts and burns that was a bit more effective than a bit of water mixed with a good amount of sweat and blood.

Pogo was happy to help.

Klaus was glad he’d washed the brain bits out of his hair before coming down given the panic Pogo was uncharacteristically displaying. Perhaps it’d been a while since he’d had to stitch anyone up. The words torture and how and who were often muttered under his breath. Klaus found it a bit amusing and a bit tiring.

As soon as Five got this damn case he was taking a nap, he deserved it.

-

Five was completely thrilled with the briefcase and even spent a good two minutes assuring that Klaus had in fact got medical assistance. So Klaus decided a nap was a great idea while his older/younger brother went off to scheme.

He woke briefly when someone crawled into bed behind him, curling around Klaus protectively.

“Go back to sleep, love.” Dave whispered in his ear.

Klaus easily slipped back under.

-

Klaus was lounging in Dave’s lap watching Luther ramble on about the apocalypse and wondering when he’d actually get to the point.

“Alright, yes, yes, you’re very important.” Klaus sighed. “But I was under the impression this was a family meeting?”

“Yes?” Luther nodded, looking at Klaus like he was wondering what his point was.

“Well, while Five is physically in the room he’s definitely not paying any attention to you.” Klaus said, gesturing to where Five was muttering under his breath and scribbling something Klaus didn’t even want to try and understand across the walls. “But Vanya just isn’t here at all.”

“Vanya?” Luther asked, sounding like someone being questioned on the validity of their stance of not jumping in front of trains.

“Yes, our sister Vanya.” Klaus replied dryly, not noticing the front door opening. “If this is a family meeting why isn’t she here? You did call her, right?”

“Vanya can’t help with this.” Luther frowned.

“Ignoring that that’s bullshit, you do realize that at least letting her know what’s going on is probably a great idea?” Klaus sighed. “Like the fact that there’s two psychos wandering around that are into kidnapping Five’s siblings? That might be something she should know. Have any of you even checked in with her?”

“She’s fine, I saw her yesterday.” Allison broke in. “And she was here when they attacked, she knows to be careful.”

“Well that’s something at least, but did you call her about this little get together?” Klaus asked.

“I-I don’t want her to get hurt.” Allison said. “She doesn’t have any powers, I’d never forgive myself if I called her here and she got caught in the crossfire.”

“Vanya is a big girl.” Klaus said bluntly. “She can make her own decisions.”

“I’m not useless.” A voice said from the entrance way.

“Vanya.” Allison blinked at her in surprise. “What are you doing here?”

“I had something I wanted to tell you.” Vanya said. “But apparently you’re not interested in returning the favor.”

“Five is being hunted by time traveling assassins trying to stop him from preventing the apocalypse that’s evidently happening quite soon.” Klaus said bluntly. “The two that broke into the house were trying to kill him.”

Vanya blinked several times at that sudden truckload of information and glanced over to see Five still scribbling on the ways.

Sir Reginald would be so livid if he saw it, Klaus was thrilled.

“The world is actually ending?” Vanya whispered.

“Maybe, we’re trying to figure out the best way to not have that happen.” Klaus offered. “Have you met Dave?”

“What, wait, Dave?” Vanya asked, thrown off balance.

Klaus stood up, pulling his husband with him to present the love of his life properly.

“This is my husband Dave.” Klaus smiled brightly. “Also has no powers and yet he’s here.”

Klaus stared pointedly at Luther before turning back to Vanya.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you.” Dave finally spoke up, plenty accustomed to letting Klaus get to his point before speaking up.

(Klaus was a rambler, he chattered about anything and everything. Dave found it endlessly endearing. He could spend hours listening to Klaus ramble on while they baked together and had done so on many occasion.)

“It’s nice to meet you to.” Vanya said, softly shaking Dave’s hand. “Oh, I should introduce you to Leonard!”

“Leonard?” Klaus smirked.

“My boyfriend.” Vanya said with a happy blush.

“How great!” Klaus grinned. “Is the mystery boy already here then?”

“Yeah, he was just upstairs.” Vanya said, turning towards the stairs.

“Over here.” An unfamiliar man said as he smiled at the group.

He was… not really ugly but certainly wouldn’t be winning any beauty contests anytime soon. Klaus privately thought that Vanya could do better, but he held his lounge.

“You must be Leonard.” Klaus smiled stepping forward and offering his hand.

The smile slid off his face as Klaus felt a chill go down his spine.

Now Klaus notably could see ghosts. More notably at this occasion he could feel ghosts, not in a physical way- that took concentration- but in a someone just walked over my grave way. This ability was quite annoying when Five was around as Klaus eternally felt slightly cold around his brother. Luckily most of the people Five had killed weren’t around this time period and therefore hadn’t found him, yet at least. There were a decent sized group of armed men that liked to follow his brother around however.

This isn’t the point at the moment. The point is the Leonard had ghosts around him. Definitely plural.

Klaus glanced to the side and saw the three figures slowly following Leonard. Ouch on looked to have had their skull bashed in. The girl was carrying a violin and looking sadly at Vanya. The final was older, looking just sad period.

“Are you alright?” Leonard asked, taking Klaus’ hand.

Klaus jerked back like he’d been burned and stumbled back, luckily caught by Dave who pulled Vanya back as well. He knew what that reaction meant.

“Wow man, what the hell?” Leonard frowned.

“You murdered your father?” Klaus whispered, eyes wide and staring at something no one else in the room could see.

“What.” Leonard froze, the smile slipping from his face.

“Holy shit, that’s harsh.” Klaus chocked out, laughing a bit hysterically. “Murdering poor Helen Cho just to clear the spot?”

“What did you say?” Vanya whispered.

Klaus turned to see his sister staring at the three men before her, face pale.

Too pale in fact, she looked like a sheet of paper- except the eyes. Those had a twinge of bright blue seeping through.

“You killed Helen?” Vanya whispered.

Chapter Text

Leonard stared, wide-eyed at Vanya as she stared at him in an interesting mix of anger and denial.

“No, I don’t even know who that is.” Leonard lied, stepping back nervously.

The room began to shake as Vanya trembled with rage.

“Liar.” Vanya whispered.

“Vanya...” Leonard said sweetly, smiling kindly. “I would never do that-”

“Liar!” Vanya screamed, throwing her hands to the side as she screamed out in rage.

This had several immediate and unfortunate effects.

The first was a pulse of energy that smashed both the chair beside Vanya and tossed both Luther and Diego several feet backwards.

The majority of the energy Vanya had accidentally released was directed at the source of her aggravation. This lead to a swift end for Leonard as he was promptly shoved through a wall and skidded across the next room at a speed that left a red smear across the floor. He didn’t get back up.

Unfortunately Klaus was just close enough that he was also caught in the blast, so to speak, to a lesser degree. This would have been alright, maybe a broken bone or two at worst, if there hadn’t been a table exactly were Klaus was thrown. Specifically the corner of a very durable wooden table that was determined that if Klaus’ head was going to break it then it would be breaking Klaus’s head. Which it did.

Klaus died immediately without a moment to spare for the thought that this was the second time in two days that he’d managed to die- and he’d been doing so well avoiding it for years.

No one immediately noticed that Klaus was no longer really with them, well in the house that was.

A young girl was currently glaring down a very sheepish looking Klaus in a world oddly lacking in color.

The first thing Luther noticed where he got to his feet was that Leonard had been partially smeared across the next room over.

The first thing Allison noticed was Vanya kneeling on the ground, looking to be either in shock or quickly getting there.

The first thing Five noticed was also that Leonard was no longer a threat, mainly due to the fact that he was trained to always check for that kind of thing first.

The first thing Vanya noticed was the ringing in her ears as the world seemed to collapse in on the single thought that she had powers.

The first thing Diego noticed was also the first thing Ben and Dave noticed and started a chain reaction of panic across the room: that being that Klaus was not getting up and there was a lot of blood currently spreading out around his head.

“Klaus!” Diego shouted, rushing to his brother’s side.

Dave was only a step behind him and Ben was already hovering over his brother not that anyone actually noticed that.

“No, Klaus, love, no, no, no.” Dave muttered as he shakily placed his fingers at Klaus’ pulse- or lack there of more accurately.

“He’s not breathing.” Diego said, wide-eyed in panic.

“No pulse.” Dave whispered.

“Mom!” Diego shouted as he scooped his brother up rushed to the infirmary with Dave at his heels.

Five was the first to move, jumping into the infirmary and managing to be the first person there, already pulling out medical supplies as Diego’s group and their mother rushed into the room.

Luther stood frozen for a moment before stepping towards Allison who had knelt down at her sister’s side.

“Are you okay Vanya?” Allison whispered softly.

“He’s dead.” Vanya whispered, staring at Leonard.

In the state of shock she was in Vanya had yet to realize that Klaus had been killed as well.

“Oh my god I killed him, I didn’t mean to, I didn’t mean to do that, how did I do that...” Vanya dissolved into panicked muttering as she began to tremble.

“No, no, Klaus will be just fine.” Allison reassured her. “It’s not your fault, we didn’t know you could even do something like that.”

“Klaus?” Vanya whispered, focusing on that single thought. “What’s wrong with Klaus?”

-

A lot was wrong with Klaus, breaking ones head open will lead to that in most cases. It’s not suggested by doctors for that very reason in fact.

It took three minutes for Mom to officially declare him dead, he had of course been dead for longer than that but his siblings were quite insistent that something needed to be done. They had to try something, that had to save Klaus.

Dave was crying into Klaus’ shoulder by the time it was officially declared.

Diego was pale and trembling as he stared down at this brother, watching as his brother-in-law clung to Klaus’ hand- their rings side by side.

Five was running every possible scenario through his head. Every way that he could try to go back and save him, stop this from happening.

And Klaus was having an interesting, if depressing, chat with his father.

-

“He-he fell.” Allison replied hesitantly to her sister.

“Fell, what...” Vanya trailed off as she caught sight of the puddle of blood on the floor and the drips leading out of the room.

“I-I did that?” Vanya whispered, voice trembling with grief.

“It’s not your fault.” Allison said. “It’s his.”

She gestured towards the remains of Harold Jenkins as she said as much, firm in the belief that all of this was that man’s fault.

Most of it was, but they had all given him plenty to work with.

Vanya suddenly jerked to her feet and rushed towards the infirmary, Allison and Luther following after her.

“Vanya, wait!” Allison said, not wanting her unstable sister in the same room as her injured brother.

Allison knew that Vanya hadn’t meant to hurt anyone, that this wasn’t her fault, but that didn’t mean that she trusted her sister not to loose control again.

Vanya didn't heed the warning and stumbled into the infirmary at a spectacularly bad moment.

“There’s nothing else I can try, dear, he died on impact.” Mom said in a soft sad voice. “Oh, my poor dear.”

Vanya froze, feeling colder than she would have if she’d been dumped into the arctic ocean. Her brother, kind sweet happy Klaus, was gone. Dead. Because of her.

Vanya screamed.

-

Klaus opened his eyes once again back in the land of the living to be confronted by absolute chaos.

Diego was screaming something.

Five was unconscious on the floor, as was Allison and Luther.

Ben was also shouted something that even Klaus couldn’t hear properly at the moment.

Dave was clinging to his hand, pale faced but determined not to let go even as invisible forces tugged at him from all sides.

And sweet Vanya was collapsed at his bedside, crying- no wailing in agony.

No one had yet noticed that Klaus was not quite as dead as he had been moments ago.

Dave was in fact the first to notice the difference when Klaus tightened the grip he had on his husband’s hand.

He looked up in shock as Klaus pushed himself up and squeezed his hand one more time before letting go and turning to his sister. Diego and Dave both stared on in shock as Klaus knelt down in front of Vanya and gently cupped her face, forcing his sister to look up at him.

“Vanya, dear, there’s no need to get all upset over a bit of blood.” Klaus smiled.

The wind stopped immediately as Vanya stared in awe up at her brother.

“Klaus.” She whispered. “But… how… you were...”

“Ah, like a little bit of death would stop me from telling Luther ‘I told you so.’” Klaus grinned.

Vanya chocked on something resembling a laugh and a sob before throwing herself into her brother’s arms, hugging him tightly.

“There, there.” Klaus said softly. “It’s alright now.”

Klaus looked over at his husband, looking very red-eyed and shaky, and smiled softly- offering a hand to him.

Dave closed the gap and pulled both siblings into a tight hug, locking his fingers around Klaus’ wrist and finding his pulse. It was an old habit from the war, feeling Klaus’ heartbeat, knowing that his love was THERE and ALIVE and OKAY. The familiar thump relaxed the poor man further as a few tears slipped out, relieved and overjoyed that his husband was alive again.

Diego sat down slowly, sliding down the wall.

“Holy shit.” He breathed out.

“Well,” Mom said. “Let me take a look at your head, Klaus dear.”

“Sure Mom, sure.” Klaus chuckled dryly.

-

The resulting conversation once everyone was awake was unpleasant on many levels.

Luther was rather upset to find out about what had been the actual cause of death for their father.

Diego was horrified to find out that Klaus had been kidnapped from right under his nose and he hadn’t noticed.

Dave was more upset about the shot in the head and torture bits.

Everyone was mutually disturbed by what they could piece together about Harold Jenkins.

Vanya agreed to ease off the medication quite quickly, Klaus nudging Luther and Five into helping out with her training.

Five was still stressed about the apocalypse, but would conclude that it wasn’t going to happen several days later when the date had come and gone.

Dave just sighed at the siblings and went to bake something to cheer everyone up, Klaus happily assisting.

In the end nothing much really changed, a few truths were revealed, a few bodies were buried in unmarked graves, a few cakes were eaten and the world went onwards as it had been doing so far.

-

A blonde women sitting behind a desk would be quite upset to find all her plans had gone up in smoke and she had no clue why they had.

-

A little girl would roll her eyes at the whole thing, as if she would let her hard work end in such a way.

-

And Klaus would never quite figure out that by picking up a black briefcase years earlier he had quite accidentally saved the entire world. He still took credit for it though.