Chapter Text
“What the fuck have you done?”
The silence that follows is deafening and only seems to enrage Five further.
“ What . Is . This .” Five hisses, throwing the paperwork down on the kitchen table. The file hits the table and skids across it.
“This is you legal,” Diego says, calmly, catching the errant papers and sliding them back into the file. “You’re officially in the system now.”
“I’m already goddamn legal,” Five yells, exasperated as he paces the length of the kitchen, anger radiating from his small hunched frame. “I don’t need to be in the system .” He sneers the last word.
Diego raises an eyebrow.
“You’re a child. You need to be legal,” Diego says. “It’s the law.”
“I’m a fifty-eight year old man!” Five stops his pacing to shriek at Diego, practically lunging across the table at his brother.
A cough interrupts them and Five stops mid lunge, hands just short of grabbing Diego’s throat.
“Five,” Luther says, voice weary and uncertain, his large frame filling the doorway, a glass of amber liquid in his hand. Scotch, he thinks. “Diego.” His eyes drift down to the file between them. “Ah, I see. He knows then.”
“You think?” Diego mutters sarcastically. He turns back to five and gently pushes the boy’s hands to the side, much more gently then Five was behaving. Five was irritable and skittish and he didn’t want to risk spooking him further with his usual instinctual trigger happy anger that Five usually brought out of him, but Five was Five and whether you treated him with kid gloves or adult ones, he always seemed to react the same. Fight and Flight . “Just sit down for a second.”
“No,” Five petulantly replies from where he regained his position from the other side of the table.
“Sit down,” Diego orders, eyes hardening.
“ You sit down,” Five snaps, but it's directed at Luther, eyes drifting over to his sibling for a second, before returning to glare at Diego. “I want you to witness how moronic Diego is being right now.”
“Okay,” Luther says without hesitation, immediately sitting in the closest chair available. He snags a small bowl of nuts from the table and drags it over to him, popping a few in his mouth, eyes darting between the two. “I’m watching.”
“Not helping, Luther…” Diego grumbles at him.
“What?” Luther shrugs nonchalantly, grinning as he pops another handful of nuts into his mouth. “I told you he would react like this if you just dumped it on him. We should have told him before.”
“He’d react like this whether he knew or not,” Diego argues back and gestures at their brother. “This way the kid didn’t have a chance to sabotage it.”
And by sabotage he meant using time-spatial jumping ninja assassin skills.
“Don’t call me that ,” Five snaps at him, stamping his foot. “ I . Am . Not . A . Child .”
Diego raises an eyebrow again and hears Luther choke on a laugh. Or maybe a nut. He wasn’t sure. Either way it garners the same reaction. Five turns hard murderous eyes at Luther, promising him a painful death.
Diego wants to say ‘are you sure about that?’ but he swallows the jibe back down his throat instead. He wants to prod and poke and watch. That was what they did. Five would sneer and insult and Diego would bait and wind him up, watching his brother build a rage into kinetic energy much the same way a toy would be cranked up and set to play.
But none of that resolved this current situation.
They had been back two weeks. Two weeks of the siblings settling back into their lives. Two weeks, to the outside world, of a child suddenly living with three adults. And their father was still dead.
He coughs and gestures at the empty chair by Five’s side.
“Can you please just sit down,” he asks. He’s not used to asking for things so nicely.
Surprisingly Five does, sliding into the chair with an exaggerated sigh and eye roll.
“You might be Fifty-eight,” Diego continues, nodding over to him, “And you might have spent Forty-Five years in an apocalypse…”
“Congratulations, Diego-” Five drawls. The way he was lazily slumped in his seat, did nothing but show him as a disinterested adolescent. “You can do math.”
Diego ignores the insult and carries on.
“- but right now. Right this second- ” Diego insists, grabbing at Five’s bony wrist, giving it a tug, knowing he risked having his fingers amputated right there and then. “You’re thirteen. You have the body of a thirteen year old-” Five surprisingly didn’t snatch his hand away or attempt to dismember him.
“A small 13 year old,” Luther interjects.
Both Five and Diego turn an identical glare towards him.
“Fuck you Luther,” Five scowls.
“- and in my eyes that makes you our responsibility,” Diego finishes, squeezing Five’s wrist to regain his attention. “We just want to protect you.”
Five does pull away then, tugging his hands away, but not before Diego catches the trembling or the way Five tries to hide it, sliding them down by his sides, out of sight.
“By making me legal?” Five parrots, lips trembling with suppressed anger, eyes flashing with hurt. “Putting me into the system? How is that protecting me, Diego?”
“We make it official. We get your name down. Dad’s dead and to anyone with a pair of eyes you’re still just a kid. There’s less chance that someone becomes suspicious, especially if one of us is your guardian. We don’t want to draw attention from the cops, CPS, the government…” Diego says.
“Well, your legal documents…” Five says, bringing his hands back up, shaking all gone, to flick at the file. “Are illegal.”
“They’re good fakes,” Diego argues. “They’re the real shit. My guy actually does this for legit.”
“And you call yourself a law abiding citizen,” Five rolls his eyes. “I can’t believe you guys selected this idiot to be my guardian,” he scoffs.
“He’s a vigilante,” Luther corrects.
“Exactly!” Five harrumphs. “You got thrown out of the police academy,” Five shrugs and grins maliciously at him. “You think anyone will buy that you’re legally allowed to look after a child.”
Diego swallows down the bitter need to jibe back.
“Well you’re stuck with me,” Diego says, voice hard. Five glares back but Diego sees the smirk to his lips, knowing he’d got under Diego’s skin.
“So what?” Five snootily asks. “Should I pack? Are you moving me into your dank little basement?”
“I’m moving in here,” Diego icily returns.
“Oh joy,” Five mutters, leaning his chair back. “It’ll be just like the old days, minus dear old dad.”
Luther snorts into his glass. Diego wonders how long the big man had been drinking. Great , he thinks, another sibling he had to worry about . At least Five was sober for this conversation.
“Are you drunk?” Five arks, arching a brow, an amused smirk to his face.
“Maybe?” Luther shrugs. “Just a smidgen.”
“Pass it here,” Five demands, eager hands reaching for Luther’s glass.
“No,” Both Diego and Luther say simultaneously. Diego watches as Luther pulls the glass protectively against his chest.
“About that-” Diego starts.
“Yeah…” Luther slurs slightly. “I think you need to stop that, young man.”
Five has the audacity to giggle.
“It’s cute that you think you can stop me.”
Despite the words he doesn’t try to take the glass again.
“So, was it a collective decision to choose Diego or did he just decide for you?” Five asks. He sounds different then before. Softer and unsure of himself. “Don’t you think Allison would have been a better choice. She’s a mother after all.”
“She’s in the middle of a custody battle, Five…” Luther sloshes what’s left of his drink towards their brother. “That’s a complication she doesn’t need.”
“Luther!” Diego snaps at Luther’s lack of tactfulness, seeing the hurt flash across Five’s face.
“So I’m a complication now?” Five asks, anger replacing hurt.
“Who’s a complication?” Klaus asks, breezing into the room with his long drape of curtain-like gown floating after him.
Luther frowns and looks away, then studies his drink as though he realises he’s overstepped the mark, “That’s not… Five, I didn’t mean it that way.”
“Aww, Fivey,” Klaus suddenly coos at his side, grabbing him by his shoulders and pulling his head into his side to pet at his head. “You’re not a complication. You’re just complicated.”
“I just spent two weeks saving your asses from not one, but two apocalypses after surviving f our decades in a post-apocalyptic wasteland,” Five snarls, shoving Klaus away from him “And I was raised by Dad. Of course I’m complicated. We all are.”
“ Touché ,” Klaus clucks, reaching out to ruffle Five’s head. Five turns to glare but doesn’t promise any further violence. Klaus nods at the table. “So, you told him then?”
“Don’t tell me you agree with this idiocy?” Five asks in disbelief.
“As much as it hurts my recovering little heart to say it out loud,” Klaus says as he unsuccessfully tries to shuffle his way onto Five’s seat, “But Diego is the only one of us who has a stable job.”
Diego sits up straighter and smirks at Five and nods.
“Are you seriously saying this cretin is the most stable out of all of us?” Five sneers at him.
Klaus hoots with laughter, swinging up onto the table and sits between them, slapping his legs with amusement.
“On the contrary, Fivey. No, Diego is definitely not stable. He likes sticking sharp pointy objects into people too much for that, but like I said, he has a job, and despite not successfully completing the academy, there are police officials who do actually vouch for him when it counts.”
Five rolls his eyes.
“And I’m a recovering addict and Vanya is still learning to control her powers.”
“And Luther?” Five asks.
“Was still living with his Dad and Mom way past the age of acceptance and went to the moon on dad’s orders just because Dad said so because he has an incessant need tom please the man. Then got turned into a furry by said dad for his troubles.”
“Hey…” Luther objects sleepily from his chair.
“In short Number 1 has serious daddy issues.”
Don’t we all, Diego muses to himself.
Five glares down at the table.
“Five, can you look at me?” Diego asks. He’s doing that voice again. Asking again.
Five doesn’t. Diego sees his brother’s jaw lock and tighten, twitching with emotion. Instead he mutters “You’re all morons,” before blipping from the room in a flash of blue light.
tbc