Chapter Text
---Diego
The crabby one, Jayme, kept staring at me while Five talked to the leader. I didn't bother to remember his name. Got a little preoccupied by the staring.
Of course shes staring. People in this house don’t know how to behave like normal humans. It’s always staring, plotting, or both.
The mansion around us looked exactly the same as when we left it, from the animal heads to the staircase that was always somehow perfectly waxed.
Still disgusting. Still too polished for a place where everything ends in violence.
The only difference I could see was the missing portrait of Five. I craned my neck toward the garden, ignoring the crabby one's looks. She keeps moving her jaw, and I can see the tongue moving inside it. Gross.
I’ve seen horrors. That still makes my skin crawl.
No statue of Ben outside. Makes sense. He didn't die in this world, so why would they make it?
Multiverse logic. Always clean in the worst possible way. Give Ben back, but make him an asshole. Fix the end of the world, but we don't belong in it anymore.
Klaus snickers beside me, under his breath. I get pulled out of my thoughts before I can think any more about Ben. Klaus quiets down when Luther pinches him.
For once. Probably temporary.
I lean against the cupboard behind me while I wait, resisting the urge to spin a knife. The conversation was going nowhere. Because of course it wasn’t. Nothing ever goes anywhere in this family except sideways and into disaster.
I wanted to talk, but who knows what these guys could do. There's no way in hell I’m risking getting sent back to the 1960s.
Been there. Not doing it again. Time travel should be illegal.
Luther tries to say something. Dad stares at him so hard I can feel the dryness on his eyes.
Sparrow Academy. Sounds like a preschool.
Or a scam. Or both.
The black one raises his voice, and I stand up, shaking an arm and ready to fight. I can already feel the adrenaline.
Finally. Something that makes sense.
Then she spits on me. The crabby one squinted, aimed, and spit. In my face.
Bitch.
I take a knife out of my belt, already adjusting to go for her first.
Because apparently diplomacy is dead and buried in this timeline, too.
The room shivered once. Then again. Nobody moved for a full second, Five still mid-sentence.
What the fuck.
The black one started moving again, and everyone followed a second behind. He started speaking, and I held the knife tighter.
Except it isn't there anymore. It's fallen to the floor, just behind where I am. Like I tossed it aside.
I crouch down to grab it, shaking my head and alleviate the throbbing pain in it. I catch the end of his sentence. “— Like men.”
Fine. That's how we’ll play. I spin around again, already holding the knife in case someone tried to attack me from behind. Nobody. Crashing comes from the kitchen's direction, so I follow. The kitchen is empty. Just a few plates, newer cabinets than in our world. Mom's nowhere to be seen.
A shiver runs down my spine as I suddenly imagine something pressed to my cheek.
I feel the need to move fast. My feet wont listen for a few seconds, and I can see my breaths puffing in front of me.
Wait, wh—
-
I turn to the knife I've dropped, as if I tossed it aside. Goosebumps rise on both my arms. I stand up slower, my gut telling me there isnt anyone behind me.
How did I know that?
I shake my head. A migraine throbs behind my eyes. Someone screams, and I instantly run to the kitchen before backtracking. That's… not where it came from.
I go upstairs, feet feeling oddly light as I run. My heart rate doesn't rise despite the adrenaline.
My bedroom: Empty. Not even a bed, just a fully empty room. Walking in farther, I see a broom in the far left corner. The window blinds are shut.
Allison's bedroom: Empty. A simple bed, queen-sized. Two pieces of clothing on the floor. Her mask (Well, not hers anymore) was on the doorknob. I rub my hands on my thighs to increase blood flow, slapping my cheeks to remind myself why it's so important to find them.
Why is it so important? The mansion looks fine.
I walk up to the window of her room, squinting at the extreme light. My breath slowly puffs out of me, hands are more relaxed than I think they should be.
I roll the blinds up.
It's black.
What's going on—
-
I spin back around, knife in hand. The mansion is empty, with an almost peaceful, eerie feeling in the quiet.
I can feel a cold wind on my ears.
I sit against the cupboard, eyes half lidded.
Half asleep, I imagine Allison screaming at me. Or maybe whispering in my ear.
A smile ghosts my lips.
---Allison
Luther shifts next to me.
Five is still trying to negotiate. "We just saved the fucking world! I'm not going to let you just-"
I could put an end to all this in an instant, just a few words. But I don't. These are people who haven't done anything wrong, just lived their lives. If anyone, we are the intruders in their home.
But being at the end of the world multiple times can degrade your patience. I clear my throat, looking at everyone quickly.
"You need to leave this house. Hurry, and we might let you out alive." Marcus says, rubbing his palms together. I already know none of ua are listening to him.
I don't know if my power would work on the cube, Christopher.
Luther seems to be a good enough match for Marcus.
Diego… is currently stuck in a staring contest with the rude-looking one. Jayme, I'm pretty sure.
I decide on the blonde woman. Her dainty figure clues me in that I should be prepared to deal with a mental power. Maybe something like Klaus’s? Or Bens?
Marcus scoffs, and Luther flexes next to me. Diego shakes an arm, resting it near his knife. Five brings his fists up.
Everything detonates into motion.
Luther drives an elbow into Marcus's stomach, folding him with a sharp grunt. Across the room, Five materializes mid-air and lands hard on the blonde, using her like a stepping stone before vanishing again.
Klaus, wildly unhelpful but fully committed, snatches a vase off a side table and smashes it over someone’s head. Ceramic explodes. Someone yells. Probably Klaus.
I hit the floor with Jayme, a mess of limbs and pain, and we both scramble for control. His hands find my hair at the same time mine find hers, and we slam into the ground again, neither of us willing to let go.
Above us, the cube moves.
Faster than it should. Faster than it has any right to.
It slams into Five mid-teleport, catching him for half a second before he twists out and reappears beside it, practically riding its momentum as he tries to redirect it.
A fist cracks into the side of my neck.
White explodes behind my eyes.
Air disappears.
I try to speak, but it comes out as nothing but a broken wheeze.
Crows caw from somewhere upstairs, someone jumping down from a balcony and falling on thier arms. Marcus towers above me.
Instinct takes over. I twist and kick upward, catching him in the ribs. It lands clean.
He staggers—
—and my legs are swept out from under me.
The fall knocks whatever air I had left into something worse.
Hands close around my throat almost immediately.
Not a dramatic pause. No hesitation. Just pressure—clean, deliberate, wrong.
My fingers claw at his wrists, but my arms feel like they’re moving through thick water. The room starts to tilt at the edges, sounds stretching out like they’ve been pulled by force.
Somewhere to my left, Luther is still fighting. Klaus is still being Klaus. The cube is still moving like it’s got a personal vendetta against physics.
The grip tightens.
My vision pulses.
“Die—” it comes out as air more than a word, shredded at the edges, useless halfway to sound.
I force my head to turn.
Diego is a few feet away.
Standing.
Perfectly still.
Eyes closed.
For a second, my brain refuses to process it properly, like it’s buffering on something it doesn’t understand. He looks… asleep. Upright, balanced, completely wrong, like someone paused him mid-action and forgot to press play again.
Then I see the knife.
It’s on the floor. Put aside like he doesn't care about any of this. His hand twitches, and I almost think he's about to wake up. Shout at me. Stab something. Anything.
His lips part, and his hand relaxes again. Like he’s in another room entirely.
My lungs burn. My fingers slip. The world narrows to a thin, screaming tunnel.
“Di—,” I try again, weaker this time.
The hand at my throat shifts, tightening just enough to remind me it can end this whenever it wants. I can see a row of teeth above me, then two eyes staring at me.
Diego doesn’t open his eyes.
Don’t look at me.
Doesn’t react at all.
He just stands there, knife in hand, breathing steady like none of this is happening in the same universe.
“A…” I force out, more panic than sound now.
Still nothing.
Still that eerie calm.
Still that stupid, impossible stillness—like he’s waiting for a signal only he can hear.
My vision starts to fracture at the edges.
And of course, the one time I actually need him to move, he’s decided to become a statue with excellent posture.