[023]
- ☾ '☂︎︎' ☽ -
Five awoke in a bed that was not his own, in a home that he was unfamiliar with, and in a room so dark that he thought it was still night if not for the dull orange light peeking through a gap in the thick curtains, signaling the steady start of another day. Another day closer to impending doom.
He struggled to sit up, his head pounding and eyes watering from the intense hangover that left him feeling like he'd been run over with a semi.
Five remembered stumbling into a library, up a flight of stairs . . . the squeak of his permanent marker on the marble walls and the clatter of his vodka bottle on the floor he sunk down to after the alcohol took control of his system.
Where was his vodka — and Delores?
He frantically scanned the room, squinted through the darkness for a shape that even closely resembled his plastic companion, and he was getting close to teleporting out of the room before the lights flicked on and he cringed away sharply.
"Calm down, Dora's downstairs in the garage," she said. Five rolled his eyes, realizing who sat in the armchair by the door. Cassidy's curly hair stuck out slightly, suggesting that she'd previously been asleep. Though her face hinted that it hadn't been for long.
Rubbing her red-rimmed eyes, Cassidy rested her elbows on her knees.
"How did you sleep?" she asked.
"Through other than what I assumed was Luther snoring and not an airstrike, not bad," Five answered. "I don't remember much after I passed out in the library. How are Batman and King Kong?"
"Diego left to deal with one of his friends. Luther well . . ." she trailed off, lost in thought. Five blinked at her, waiting for an answer. He wondered what kind of trouble he inadvertently got himself into, hopefully something that didn't get him killed. "I think we need to tell him. About the Apocalypse."
It seemed Cassidy wanted to do just that.
"No, that's out of the question. He doesn't need to be involved with anything," Five said tersely.
"You were blabbing all about it last night when you were drunk so he's somewhat aware that something is off. Five. The extra muscle might help and if we run into those circus freaks again he can hold them off."
"I trust you with that. You beat Luther when we trained . . . I trust you." The admittance surprised him. Yet it was true. If there was anyone he would trust with even a fraction of his strange life, it was Cassidy. Her powers were obviously helpful, no matter how macabre and he didn't quite trust some gym rat with the DNA of a chimpanzee protecting him from two assassins with guns.
Cassidy, grimaced then leaned back in her chair and crossed her legs before gesturing tiredly at herself. "Do I look like I'm capable of fighting?"
"You need rest. How much did you sleep last night?"
"That's not important."
"It is to me, Cass."
She blinked at him before sighing. The dull light in the room threw the tired lines of her face into sharp contrast against her skin. "Three hours."
"Go sleep. We'll talk about this later." He stood up, somewhat shakily, then moved for the door. "I'm not telling Luther about the apocalypse. He's too much of a tripping hazard and distractions are not what I need."
"I already told him that you needed to tell him the truth."
"You what?" he hissed. Spinning to face her unfazed expression as she reclined. "Don't you trust me? Don't you know what I've done to save you all?"
"No, I don't because I've been trying to protect my . . . other friends. And say my goodbye's before it's too late because you haven't scooped up any genius plan that I know of so we aren't any closer to saving the world."
"Have some faith, Cassidy." Such a controversial statement, he was running on little to no faith. If someone could have a little in him, maybe he could make it out of this thing alright. But Cassidy's response only angered him.
"I'm a realist Five, faith isn't in my nature."
"And surrender isn't in mine," he snapped. Five did not spend nearly four decades in a god-forsaken wasteland to come back and have the one person who could even remotely help him give it up completely.
"I'm not surrendering. I've come to terms with the fact that if we die, we die. Bad things happen to good people. I'm ready to accept my fate if that's what it comes to, but I'll fight if I have to."
"What's wrong with you?" Five nearly screamed. "What happened to 'family never give up?' Why don't you get off your ass, stop complaining like you always do, and help me try to save our family, Number Eight."
Cassidy stared at him, her tired eyes betraying a deep sense of hurt. "How do you do that? Say horrible things like their some incredible truth?"
"Because it is true, it's about time you focused on your problems instead of trying to fix everyone else's, Number Eight."
"Don't call me that."
"Sorry — would you prefer 'The Demon' instead?"
"I don't have time for this," she stood up but Five shoved her down in her chair forcefully, his hand on the edge of the chair, trapping her.
"Why? Scared to face your problems? Or are you just going to distract yourself with everyone's issues so you don't have to deal with yours? You can't let this fear eat you up, it's not healthy," he scolded, a scowl on his face.
"Are you saying you're not scared? The world is about to end in a few days and you're not even a bit scared?" she accused, looking angry.
"I'm not scared for myself."
It became silent, the air crackling around them, staring down at each other. Both with variations of hurt in their eyes, yet each too prideful to admit it and too stubborn to be the first to look away. It became a battle of wills, and walls too cracked to hide all of the pain. They were just kids after all.
Luther suddenly walked into the room, a curious and slightly worried expression on his face. Five went and sat back down on the bed and reluctantly began explaining everything he'd done in the days prior, including his misfortune with the glass eyeball that he had pried from Luther's cold dead fingers in the apocalypse.
"Why didn't you say anything sooner?" asked Luther after sitting in a bemused sort of silence for nearly five minutes.
"It wouldn't have mattered," Five murmured.
"Of course it would. We could've banded together and helped you stop this thing."
"For the record we already tried. I found all of you ... most of you," he glanced in Cassidy's direction painfully.
"We all die?" Luther said.
"Horribly," Five swallowed bitterly. "You were together, trying to stop whoever it was that ends the world. Every living thing that was left was either killed or killing."
"Piece of shit!" There suddenly came a loud slamming noise, followed by the bedroom door being flung open aggressively. Diego stood there, livid and shaking with rage, but there were tracks down his face that suggested that he had been crying. "Do you have any idea of what you just did?" he growled, gripping Five by the collar.
Luther gripped him around the waist and yanked him back.
"You little —get you're ape hands off me, Luther." Diego struggled wildly before realizing that Luther wouldn't let him go until he composed himself. Jerking out of his arms, Diego smoothed his jacket then pointed a shaking finger at Five who sat staring at him looking like a child who didn't take his parent's threats seriously. Cassidy had moved back in her chair, giving the fuming man a wide berth.
"What are you talking about, Diego?" she asked.
"Our brother's been pretty busy since he got back. He was in the middle of that shootout at Griddy's, and then at Gimble Brothers after the guys in masks attacked the Academy, looking for him."
"None of which is your concern," said Five.
Panting like a wounded animal, Diego prodded the boy sharply in the chest. "It is now. They just killed my friend."
Cassidy grimaced. "I'm sorry, Diego." But the man waved her apology away.
"Who are they, Five?" asked Luther.
"They work for my former employer. A woman called the Handler. She sent them . . . to stop me. Then, soon as Diego's friend got in the way, well, fair game."
"And now they're my fair game and I'm gonna make them pay," Diego growled.
"That would be a mistake, Diego. They've killed people far more dangerous than you," Five warned.
But Diego waved him away dismissively, "We'll see about that." Then he was gone with a door slam that shook the walls. Five sighed and rubbed his face. "He'll get himself shot."
"What's this really about, Five? And don't give me any 'none of your business' crap, all right?"
Five took a deep breath, one that betrayed his age for a moment. Shadows of lines across his face flashed briefly before he rubbed his exhausted eyes once more.
"I worked for an organization called the Commision. We are tasked with the prevention of the time continuum through manipulation and removals."
"I don't understand," Luther said. Cassidy shushed him.
"Sometimes, people . . . make choices that alter time. Free will, don't get me started," Five grumbled. "When that happens, we dispatch one of our agents to . . . eliminate the threat. They turned me into the perfect instrument for rehabilitation of the time continuum. Or 'corrections,' as they called them. I wasn't the only one. There are others like me. Beings out of time, fractured, extracted from the lives that they knew. I don't know how they got there. But I do know that none of them were as good as me." He could feel Cassidy's eyes on him, watching him.
But she wasn't merely staring with a strange look on her face, a far away expression and a dull yet calculating look in her eyes. Yet Five continued.
"They didn't realize, I was biding my time, trying to figure out the right equation so I could get back. If I could get back, I knew I could stop the apocalypse. Save the world."
The silence that followed was painful, only interrupted by the rusty cogs turning in Luther's struggling brain.
"So you were a hitman?"
"Yes."
"I mean, you had a code, right? You didn't just kill anyone?"
Cassidy rolled her eyes. It was moronic and childish, she thought, that someone who'd smashed countless bodies into band ceilings and crushed the spines of over a dozen criminals was concerned about the number of lives his brother had taken when he himself was no less guilty of snuffing out a few lights.
"Luther, there are bad people out there," she muttered.
"Since when have you justified killing?" Luther snapped at her, shocked.
"I don't. But sometimes what has to be done has to be done, I don't promote it, goodness no, I'm not a sadist."
Five spoke up suddenly, "No code, Luther. We took out anyone who messed with the timeline. What about innocent people?"
"It was the only way I could get back here," Five whispered.
"But that's . . . murder!"
"Jesus, Luther, grow up. We're not kids anymore. There's no such thing as good guys or bad guys. There's just people, goin' about their lives. But when the world ends, all those people die, including our family."
Cassidy stood up suddenly, and left the room. Saying nothing, not looking at them. They heard her walk down the stairs. Luther took no notice of this, but Five did. He always did. "Time changes everything," he murmured, staring after her.
Another hour passed, in which Five and Luther ran over strategies after strategies, and the teenage boy harassed him with a multitude of mathematical equations and a few snarky comments before he decided that some hot coffee was in order and went downstairs.
Upon arriving at the kitchen, he discovered Cassidy already there, pouring his coffee in a large pot, he accepted it without a word and sipped it carefully. Cassidy didn't usually have coffee in the house but normally kept a back or two of the stuff in case Pogo had ever stopped by, which was often.
"Aren't you going to have anything? You must be tired," Five said, after a moment of observing the bruises under her eyes.
"I have something stronger than coffee," she answered and held her own mug up before downing half the amber liquid inside. That was how it went. They'd have an argument, glare at each other for a while, then all would be forgiven immediately after one of them made coffee and locked eyes over the rising steam. Five supposed it was convenient, he was never one for long heartfelt apologies.
"Now, what are we going to do about our apocalypse problem? I got hungry and didn't want to hear you and Luther argue for an hour," said Cassidy. She leaned against the counter peering against him over her cup.
Sipping his drink again, Five sighed and shook his head. "I didn't get much done with Luther. I'm at a loss."
They sat in a contemplative silence before Cassidy spoke up again. "You mentioned that there were other people in the apocalypse with you. What did you mean?"
His answer was short, "They weren't people per-say, much worse in fact, like something from a waking nightmare."
"What? Like Cropsey? Hiding in basements and whispering in your ear at night?" Cropsey was an imaginary creature they had created as children to cope with the eerie sounds and strange occurrences like loud bangs and screechings they heard in the night. Results of Reginald's experimentations.
"Its not a joke, Cassidy. There were . . . things there with me."
"What kind of things?"
"Monsters. Creatures in the apocalypse with me," he drank again, "I didn't hallucinate, you know. I'm not a liar or a schizophrenic."
Cassidy went quiet and then poured herself another mug of alcohol. She was quiet and Five could see the cogs in her brain turning. He liked that about her, always thinking, her mind never at rest. Much like himself.
"You said you never found my body. What do you think happened?"
The question caught him off guard, at first he contemplated lying to her to preserve her feelings. Until he remembered that this was Cassidy Hargreeves, the same Hargreeves who stood her ground when she got a baseball bat to her face when they had a scuffle with some neighborhood kids when they snuck out so many years ago. But he also couldn't quite manage the nonchalance as he whispered, "I think they found you."
She merely nodded, processing. Yet again, another thing he admired, her poker face. "But what does this all mean? How does this tie to the apocalypse?"
"It means we are being watched; observed. There's something out there, and I think it has something to do with the end of the world. Foul play is at work, and I don't know how to stop it."
A.N. ——
Hello everyone, Its been well over a month since my last update of HOS and I cannot thank you enough for your patience. I've been extremely busy with my final exams. Studying, procrastinating, drinking WAY too much tea, and practicing for a long and exhausting speech that will cost over half my semester grade.
In short, my brain feels like a wet sponge and I'm sleep deprived. Alas, c'est la vie.
But thankfully, the nightmare is over and I am faces with the second bout of anxiety that is editing. Yet, since I'm in too deep to stop, love Cassidy too much, and have vowed to never leave a project unfinished I have emerged from the dark-lands — aka. my bedroom — to bring you ✨another chapter✨
Thank you for all the support so far and I hope you enjoy the story and, most of all, Cassidy Hargreeves. Comment and vote if you'd like and follow if you like my work. Have an amazing rest of your week, everyone.
Much love,
Ezzy <3