Five Hargreeves oneshots

Back Again || Season 1

⚠️Before we begin, this is an au of mine where Five is still 13 years old and isn't 58⚠️

Five falls out of the portal and everyone stares as him. "Does anyone else see small Number Five?" Klaus asks, Five looks at the others, he's back home.... He finally did it!

They all pile into the kitchen and wait for Five's explanation, but he doesn't give them one.

{Five's point of view}

I know that they're looking for an answer, but I just got back and I'm tired. "Can you give us an answer now?" Klaus asks me, I get frustrated and teleport in front of him. "Ask me again and I'll burn you with a cigarette lighter." I teleport next to the fridge and open it. I grab a water bottle from it, but then Allison takes it from me. "You've changed... I don't like it." I sigh, she's right... But I'm not ready to open up about anything...

The water bottle slipped from Allison's grasp, clattering to the linoleum floor with a dull thud. Her words, though spoken softly, echoed in the stunned silence of the kitchen, a stark articulation of the unease that had settled over the room like a shroud.

I knew I was different. Forty-five years trapped in a desolate wasteland had a way of changing a person, even one as stubborn and self-reliant as me. But hearing Allison say it aloud, the fear and uncertainty lacing her voice, was like a punch to the gut.

"Give him some space, Allison," Luther rumbled, his brow furrowed with concern. He always did have a soft spot for me, the big lug. "He just got back. He's probably exhausted."

Exhaustion was an understatement. My body ached, every muscle screaming in protest from the temporal jump. But the fatigue ran deeper than that, a bone-deep weariness that had seeped into my very core after decades spent fighting for survival.

"Exhausted?" Klaus scoffed, his usual flippant demeanor replaced by a flicker of genuine hurt. "He's being downright rude! We thought you were dead, Five! Dead! And you can't even be bothered to tell us where you've been?"

His words stung, but I pushed the feeling down, burying it beneath layers of practiced indifference. Opening up, explaining the horrors I'd witnessed, the things I'd done to survive... it was too much. The words felt like shards of glass lodged in my throat, impossible to utter without shattering me from the inside out.

"Look, I'm not in the mood for an interrogation," I growled, my voice raspy with disuse. "I just need some sleep. We can talk about this later."

I turned to leave, desperate for the sanctuary of my room, but Vanya's voice, small and hesitant, stopped me in my tracks.

"What if later never comes?"

I turned back to face them, my siblings, my family... so familiar, yet so different through the lens of my time-displaced memories. Their faces, a mixture of relief, confusion, and dawning hurt, mirrored the turmoil raging within me.

I wanted to tell them everything. To unburden myself, to share the weight of my experiences, to seek solace in their embrace. But the fear, a venomous serpent coiled tightly around my heart, whispered insidious doubts in my ear.

What if they didn't understand? What if they looked at me, their eyes filled not with recognition but with fear and revulsion? What if, after all this time, I was still utterly and completely alone?

So I did the only thing I could think to do. I retreated. Not with a spatial jump, not this time. This retreat was far more insidious, a withdrawal into the fortress of my own mind, the walls built high and strong from years of solitude and self-preservation.

"Later," I said, my voice devoid of emotion, a hollow echo of the boy I once was. And with that, I turned and walked away, leaving them standing there in the wreckage of my return, the unspoken words hanging heavy in the air between us.