I personally like the idea of viktor getting into sports 🥺 he really had no reason to before, and even once he was out on his own before, music was still his focus. but i think being in an entirely new environment, with the freedom to do whatever he wants and to finally figure out who he really is, what he enjoys, what his hobbies are beyond what he felt tied to before, he starts trying to broaden his horizons into things that he wouldn't have before.

not that he was really getting a lot of invites places before, but i do think that now that he's gaining more confidence + self-assurance in who he is and maybe who + what he wants to be, he tries to say yes to any invitation he receives. he makes friends at his bar and starts to join them for different events, particularly hockey games, and he discovers he really enjoys it. he likes rooting for a team like that, rather than... the kind of team he grew up with, given what it turned out to be and the misconceptions he had of it all that time.

here’s a little something for all of his siblings:

LUTHER:    i wrote this a long time ago from luther’s perspective,   but i think about it all the time and i’m applying it to viktor because.   i can. <3    luther sought out viktor after ben’s funeral.  he’s quick to defend him when diego’s mean to him,  and he’s their leader,   often trying to smooth things over between their father + his siblings,   so he goes to viktor to make sure he’s okay.   doesn’t mean he really knows what to say to him,  obviously,  but —  luther and viktor both share guilt for what happened to ben.   it obviously was neither of their faults,  reginald was going to force ben to go no matter what,  but viktor wanted to take his place,  and luther forced him to go,   and they both feel responsible.   and i think luther would understand that viktor feels that guilt too,  and perhaps that they’re the only two who really get it with each other.   most of this talk is just luther sitting silently with viktor,   but it’s something that viktor never forgot.  he hated not being part of the team that day,  and diego made him feel even worse when he reminded him,  so luther checking in on him was so crucial to viktor.   it also,  even though luther wouldn’t have realized it,  pushed viktor into the direction of finally leaving home soon.

also,  this is another one of my luther headcanons that i’m repurposing for viktor because i can<3  they shared a love of music.   a lot of luther’s music collection includes the violin and it’s hardly even something he sought out intentionally,   it was just natural for him to enjoy that kind of music,  and he and viktor exchanged many different artists and records and were constantly learning from each other.   that’s kind of the only personal thing they bonded over as kids,   but it was always really special to viktor to have something like that with him.

DIEGO:   there’s a lot about diego that viktor was envious of— and  a lot of this is probably coming from my trans diego since season 1 agenda,  but i think about it all the time when they’re interacting,   how he is exactly the kind of teenage boy that viktor wanted to be.   and maybe he has a skewed perception of who diego really is,  considering he’s often on the outside of everything,  but i just think there’s a lot that viktor wanted to model himself after.   maybe just as simple as his body language,   or his haircuts,  or his quick remarks,  or his black clothing once he got the chance to actually have his own clothing.   obviously viktor doesn’t really act like diego,  because he wouldn’t have been confident enough back then to try,  but there are certain ticks of diego’s that viktor did pick up.  

ALLISON:   viktor really admired allison for her confidence,  something viktor never excepted himself to have.  similar to what i’ve said about diego,  there was a point in time when viktor thought he needed to be more like allison,  but he quickly realized that was never for him.  when viktor read books,  the popular girls reminded him of allison,  and that’s kind of what he envisioned allison would’ve been if growing up in normal circumstances—  popular,  head cheerleader,  the girl all the guys wanted,  etc  ( part of this is just coming from reading tua: young blood, but still true. )  

KLAUS:   this is from an old thread i did many years ago with my friend who isn’t writing anymore,  but it’s so special to me so i’m just making it a general headcanon.   viktor approached klaus to cut his hair once when they were teenagers.  klaus did a really sloppy job,   but it didn’t even matter to viktor,   because when he looked in the mirror,  he felt a sense of relief that he never understood back then.   he didn't care that it was jagged and that he probably looked silly;   he liked the short hair on him.    and since klaus liked stealing their skirts,   viktor took that as an opportunity,   offering to trade his skirts for klaus’s pants.   again,  something he wasn’t really processing back then,  only thinking of it as something that was helping klaus and hardly realizing that it was so much more comfortable for himself,  too.  (  allison later fixed his haircut.   thank you allison.  )  

FIVE:    after five disappeared,  viktor would often sneak into five’s room and sleep there.  never in his bed,  but curled up in the corner of his room with a blanket and a pillow.   he thought that if five were ever to return,  then he’d find the snack viktor left for him,  along with the light on,  and then he’d come up to his bedroom,  and viktor would be the first person to greet him.   viktor was so anxious about him coming back that he needed to know he was safe immediately once he had the chance.   this didn’t last long,  though.   reginald eventually forced viktor back into his own room and warned him not to do it again.  it didn’t stop viktor from leaving a note in five’s room anyway,   a small plea to come find him as soon as he got back.   i don’t necessarily think that viktor fully believed five would return someday—  he just needed to do something to act like he would,   because that’s what kept him going. 

viktor hasn't played the violin since the 2019 apocalypse.   and it’s not that he’s totally against ever picking one up again,  it’s just a source of so much trauma that he’s still working through.   as he said in season 4,   he has a love-hate relationship with it.   there was so much that he loved about it.   there’s also so much he resented,   even before he made it a weapon.

reginald letting viktor have the violin is such a defining moment in his life— it’s one of the few good memories that he has with his father,   one of the few that doesn’t necessarily feel tainted by their surroundings or was later ruined by some other self discoveries.  for all his life up until that moment,  there really wasn’t anything for him to do.   he watched his siblings from the sidelines and was constantly feeling less and less like he was actually even a part of the family,  because he was always on the outside with nothing to do.   it made him antsy,   it made him even more eager to find his way into the team.   that never really stopped even after he discovered the violin,   but it at least kept him busy,   which made things comfortable for reginald,  i’m sure.

so finally, viktor has something to do.  something that’s just his.   something that makes him feel special,   even if it doesn’t necessarily make him seem special to everyone else.   all of his siblings have their own powers and skills—  but viktor never had that.   and then suddenly,  here he is,  learning a musical instrument and he is the one with his very own skill.   and that makes him really proud.  violin music is practically a constant soundtrack to his siblings’ days,   viktor is always present even when he doesn’t necessarily feel it  ( and even when his siblings don't necessarily notice, too.  something i would imagine they actually start to miss once they’re apart. ) 

when viktor leaves home,  the violin is all he’s really known.   he doesn’t have much of an identity out of being the ordinary one of the family—   and even that is hardly an identity,  given that he’s the unknown + forgotten member of the family,  not even a member of the team,  so when he’s finally free to be on his own:   who is he?   he never really answers that question for himself pre-series.  he has to build a life for himself now that he’s finally free,  and yet,   to him,  his only real value is the violin.  

and he’s the only one who played it at home,  so he thinks that maybe,  he could be the best at something.   finally.  it’s not that he necessarily has a dream of being some big symphony star,  but—  he thinks he could be even better in a professional setting and this is his chance to make a name for himself,  for the first time in his life.   and then he spends years never making first chair,   even when he felt it in reach,  and it was just another reminder that no matter how good he was at anything,   he’d never be extraordinary.  helen hadn’t been unseated in five years,  and viktor admired her,   basically putting himself in the same cycle he grew up in—   the person with special talent that he looked up to didn’t believe he would ever be special enough.   

so he tries to teach violin lessons because— again,  what else does he have?   and maybe he’s better at that than actually playing in the orchestra,  something he has to come to accept as he watches kids who are already proving that they’re going to end up way better than viktor.   viktor tries to work on his skills,  tries to do what he can to be even better,  but ultimately,  he can never reach any real perfection.

he gets to a point when he realizes that playing violin is…   all he really has.   and he’s kind of lost himself in it,   wondering if he ever truly liked it or if it was just all there was for him to do.  even helen didn’t believe viktor had any real passion in it.   and part of viktor is very aware of this,  but he likes music,  and he’s held onto it for so long,   it’s hard to imagine himself without it.  

there’s a lot i could say if i had the words right now to discuss how the violin was the perfect weapon for him to wield at the end of the world because of how his ‘love’ for it started,  but—  this is exactly why he hasn’t picked it up again.   it’s not even necessarily that he’s scared of the power that was in his hands with it,   it’s just that it’s attached to so much trauma now.  and once his memories came back to him in the ‘60s,   he had to face the fact that he really didn’t love playing the violin as much as he thought he did.   or if anything,   he liked it as a hobby—  not necessarily as a performer,  because viktor wasn’t meant for the spotlight,  so he didn’t know what to do in it.

obviously in season 2,  he doesn’t have his memories,  so he doesn’t know he played the violin  ( though the scene of sissy feeling his hands to try to figure it out,  deeply important to me.  + i do think if he were to pick one up,  he’s surprise himself with the muscle memory. )   obviously,  season 3 is only a few days,  so it never made sense for him to play,  or really even talk about it then.   but with him going on his own way post season 3 + being without powers,   he does have the chance to play again.   but he doesn’t.  he’s trying to move on with his life and also try to build a life for himself for the first time,   and the idea of picking up a violin scares him,   because it feels like going backwards.   and he’s doing everything he can to not go backwards.    he has to get to a place where he can accept that it can just be a casual hobby for him,  and then he might try again—  but until he’s comfortable enough with that thought,  he avoids it.

there’s a stage in his bar that is crucial to all of this,  at least to me.  that’s an addition viktor added once he made the bar his own.   music is important to him,  and he wants to be around it,  wants to invite local bands / artists in to play without the pressure that viktor’s been used to back when he was in the orchestra.  he wants it to be fun and for people to discover new music and he wants to be around it himself.   this is him slowing getting close to a day in which he picks up a violin again,  but honestly,   i like the idea of him trying to learn a new instrument strictly for fun.   i think it would be good for him and it would be easier for him to accept a more casual approach to music and ultimately get him back to a place where he can love the violin again. 

Headcanon Questions | Always accepting!

OKAY so like, I’m gonna try to be organized in this response and respond to this in a sort of chronological order of what I think Klaus' timeline would be after arriving in a powerless timeline...

I think, for the most part, Klaus would be totally fine without his powers?? He wouldn't relapse back into his addiction like the show seems to suggest, that's for damn sure. And I mean, of course it would definitely be an adjustment— in the first few years, Klaus would definitely still rely on his siblings (he’d probably still wind up at Allison’s place, or maybe even with Five or Luther) just because, like, my dude has never had a job in his life?? he doesn’t know what the fuck to do now that he’s not running this constant, decades-long marathon???

Because like. The thing is: aside from maybe Luther and Ben, Klaus is the only sibling who couldn't turn his powers off at all. Klaus has spent over 30 years living with something that he couldn't avoid and couldn't dampen without hurting himself in the process and idk I think somewhere along the line he just got so used to hurting himself and numbing himself, so to take away that pain is liberating, but I also think there's a part of Klaus that would genuinely kind of mourn the life he could have had all these years if he'd never had the power to begin with :(

So all of that is to say: there’s definitely an adjustment period where he realizes that actually he doesn't know who the fuck he is outside of his addiction and his powers. Maybe he hops around from sibling to sibling, or maybe he stays with Allison and takes up knitting again, and writing, and maybe he starts to pick up Claire from school and help her with her school projects and he finds that actually, he kind of likes that kind of thing. And that doesn't mean he turns into a bubble-wrapped grandpa overnight— Klaus is still Klaus. He's still impulsive, he's still weird and curious and mischievous. But maybe instead of going out on a bender, he prefers to do karaoke night with Claire.

Like, the longer I think about the germaphobia thing, though, the more I realize that I actually don't prescribe to that characterization...at all. Because that entire concept hinges on two predications which are: 1. the idea that Klaus, without his powers, is afraid of death. And 2. that Klaus has something to live for.

And I don't think either one of those things would be true, at least at the beginning of s4. Even without the guarantee of immortality, Klaus is never truly afraid of death. In his mind, he never really planned on living past the age of 20. In fact, every time Klaus has gone into the void, he never wants to leave. The void is where Dave is, and his mom, and all the crap television his heart desires. He's died a thousand times by this point, what's one more?

Plus, if we're being honest...before his relationship with Claire and Allison really forms, there's not a whole lot that he would even be motivated to stick around for in the first place. like sure, his family would be bummed if he kicked the bucket but like, they don't need him?