#apocalypsejumped

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     “Vanny, I’m gettin’ right down to it.”

@apocalypsejumped disturbed the concert.

      THE    SWEET    SYMPHONY    OF    MUSIC    OSCILLATES    THROUGH    THE    SILENCE.    each plucked string    ,    each shrieking note    ,    bow playing to a lovely tune.    it’s beautiful to the newfound authority    :    commander of the melody.    with every note comes another surge    ,    blowing away at anything that’s deemed unfit to exist.    it’s only when she discovers her sibling that the music slows    ,    allowing him to get closer.

I present the real way this scene went.

     “I, uh… what?”

Five looks up from his feverish scribbling in his notebook and frowns at Klaus with a mildly confused expression.

His brother, as usual, is on an entirely different tangent than what they’d been discussing previously. Somehow, Five is sure it connects, but he can’t for the life of him begin to fathom how Klaus’s brain works.

     “Actually, I know this one. Read it somewhere in an old library that was still standing. The King of Hearts–” He ducks his head and keeps writing. “–Lost his mustache due to a reproduction error of the original design. It’s the same reason he looks like he’s stabbing himself in the head. The sword used to be an axe, so now it looks like he’s impaling himself.”

@muse-gathering​

[His eyes, their stare steady and unblinking, never left Five. Normally, he mimicked breathing and blinking as doing so made him feel less dead and comforted Klaus, but this time Five took all his focus. Five wrote furiously in his notebook, pages absorbing his calculations or notes or whatever like fresh rainfall upon parched ground. However, just as Ben felt he may catch a glimpse of something in his brother’s eyes, Klaus spewed words with abandon and the concentration was lost. The conversation flooded back to him then, Klaus’s questions processing late. This time at least, Ben thought knew how Klaus’s brain shifted from their previous topic.]

[For a moment, Ben thought Five might decide to hop elsewhere in response. Ben wouldn’t blame him; Klaus could quickly devolve from a decent conversational partner to a breathing diversion. Instead, Five took the tangent and offered more information.] 

Klaus turned the new information over for a beat longer than might seem natural, tilting his head back and stretching his neck as he rested his weight on his palms, arms outstretched behind him. His eyes caught on Ben briefly from his lack of movement. Often, a dead demeanor indicated disappointment; Klaus felt as though he did something wrong, but he couldn’t pinpoint what it could be. He wasn’t currently sober, sure, but how often was he? Today was pretty tame as far as that went. The behavior didn’t add up, which made him antsy. He often disappointed Ben, but rarely without understanding why. “Huh. Well, three out of four’s not bad odds.” This explanation didn’t interest him as much, though, so he shifted back to his original consideration, adding a thoughtful, “Maybe he’s impaling himself because they houdinied his moustache. He should chill out. It’ll grow back, you know?” 

[This was his chance. Ben could feel the potential in the air like a lit match held above a pool of gasoline: Five was engaging in conversation and brought up the past; Klaus was following the thread of conversation and relatively with it; the setting was quiet and calm. His eyes trailed to Klaus, “Klaus.” He couldn’t ask himself, but if he could just get Klaus to stay serious for just a few minutes maybe he could guide them both to help each other.]

His eyes flitted to Ben, searching his brother for an indication as to his shortcoming. Granted, whatever it was didn’t matter. Ben was perpetually disappointed. 

[“Ask him about the old library.” Ben quoted exactly to help Klaus remember.]

diego  doesn’t  mean  to  snap  at  five  but  he’s  just...he  needs  to  be  left  alone  and  the  other  is  in  his  space.  the  other  is  crossing  a  line  that  he  hasn’t  been  invited  to  cross.  diego  isn’t  one  for  opening  up  and  he’s  certain  five  knows  that.  that’s  not  something  knew  about  him.

his  nose  flares  as  his  hands  ball into  fist.  count  to  ten,  diego.  that’s  eudora’s  voice.   a  reminder  that  patience  can  go  a  long  way  to  getting  what you  want.  he’s  patient  enough.  when  it’s  a  child  who  needs  help  or  an  innocent  person.  his  brother  is  neither  and  it  makes  it  so  easy  to  push  him  away.

Klaus is playing Kirby on a vintage Nintendo GameBoy some particularly zealous Umbrella Academy fan gifted him (ever shifting between the extreme poles of self-preservation and recklessness, Number Four had torn open the mysterious package addressed to him, and immediately become addicted). His tongue is stuck out the side of his mouth.

He makes no complaint as Number Six joins him, in fact budging closer, so they're snuggled up against each other. Most of his siblings grudgingly allow his frequently physical affection, once he's explained it's a form of reassurance they're not dead.

""I....dunno, Benny," he mumbles, as the little dot matrix ghost inhales the bad guys on-screen. "I know I've tried t'conjure him in private, and he never comes, so...I mean....that's hopeful, yeah?"

Green eyes, very nearly the same hue as their missing brother's, flicker to Ben's furtive face, seeking comfort there.

    “Nfffff, yeah well.  Shouldn’t you be happy?”  

Klaus steps completely naked into the shower, rinsing the blood off the plentiful slices in his arms and ribs and thighs.   Yet another special would-be Hargreeves sibling, in this fucked timeline, and he got a little ambitious trying to protect the others: all with this dawning thirst to prove he’s capable of being a functional, reliable weapon, like they are. 

A team member worth something. 

    “I mean,” and he turns that occasional but stunningly sharp-barbed tongue on Five, “don’t you need me to satisfy your crisis-fix?  Vanny and the others, they’re the grown-up siblings you don’t have to coddle, but good old Klaus, he’s another story.”