𝐚𝐥𝐰𝐚𝐲𝐬 𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 | 𝐟𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐫𝐞𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐬

|♠ 𝗍𝗁𝖾 𝖾𝗇𝖽 ♠|

TW: blood, gore

♚ 𝐕𝐈𝐈𝐈 ♕
| 𝖮𝖼𝗍𝗈𝖻𝖾𝗋 12th, 2001 |

"I KILLED HIM."

"...Five?"

Even at twelve years old, Five had a serious, haunted look in his eyes. I watched, waiting for him to do something.

My gaze slid to the body he held in his arms. A boy, same age as us. A knife in his limp, unmoving hand. The same knife that was being held up against my throat just a few minutes ago, the same hand holding it.

And now, the boy was dead. Five had killed him, just before the boy was going to kill me.

I usually never had a second thought about killing people, whenever we went on missions. They were always adults, anyway. They were always the bad guys.

But now...things were complicated.

We had killed a kid. Five had killed a kid.

The boy's throat was a crimson mess.

I stared at his cut skin and flesh. Five stared at him too, eyes wide. I waited for him to drop the boy, shrug it off and wipe the blood from his hands off onto his blazer. But Five only held the boy, and he held him tenderly, as if this kid was a dear friend.

We had gone on this mission by ourselves. Sometimes Dad did stuff like that, sending us in pairs or trios or even sometimes one of us at a time.

I stepped forward, gently placing a hand on Five's shoulder. "Five...? Are you okay?"

He didn't answer me. He just stared at the kid.

"Five, it's okay...he was going to kill me, alright? He's one of the bad guys."

Then my brother bowed his head and began to sob over the little boy's body.

♚ 𝐕𝐈𝐈𝐈 ♕
| 𝗉𝗋𝖾𝗌𝖾𝗇𝗍 𝖽𝖺𝗒 |

"GUYS," Five panted as we scrambled over the rubble of our home, avoiding the smoke that twirled and danced throughout the air. "This is it. The apocalypse is still on. The world ends today."

"I thought you guys said it was over," Luther said in an accusatory tone. All our family was crowded around together, tired and dirty and bloody.

"Well, news flash, it's not, okay?" I snapped, snatching the newspaper out of Five's hand and shoving it into Luther's face. "Listen. Five found this same newspaper when he got stuck in the future. The headline is still the same."

"No, that doesn't mean anything," Diego insisted, shaking his head. "The time could've been altered since that newspaper came out this morning."

"You're not listening to us," Five hissed. "When I found it, I assumed this place came down along with everything else. But here we are. The Moon's still shining, the Earth is in one piece, but not the Academy."

Klaus snatched the newspaper out of my hand, thumbing through the pages and pacing. "I'm confused."

"Then listen to me, you idiot!" Five spat. "Vanya destroys the Academy before the apocalypse." He paused, scoffing. "I thought Harold Jenkins was the cause, but he was the fuse. Vanya is the bomb. Vanya causes the apocalypse."

There was a horrible moment of silence before Luther broke it. "We have to find her."

The whir of helicopter blades came into hearing range, and we all blinked as a bright light beamed down onto us from above.