Attacca ─ Five Hargreeves

01. Blessed-Cursed

So, they lied.

The future was not promising at all.

Where were the skyscrapers that could counter natural collisions? Or the advanced technology to anticipate tragedies? Or flying postmen and flying cars? Or people—just people. Where was it all? Was it lost? Sinking to the bottom of the seven seas? Did the man on the moon fail to bear a hand for everyone? Or did they fail to build a massive spaceship on time? Well, overall, they were wrong.

The future was nothing. Barren, with silence reflecting through every crevasse, taunting the scientists and investors buried somewhere along the way, sharing graves with weathered dreams and innovations. It was sad to see what was once everyone's homeland, now covered in ashes, dust, sparks fire, corpses—everything dead, bedazzled by waves of heat and searing winds.

Unfortunately, the future, this future, became Number Five's present day.

A lot of queries surely filled Five's head, yet there was no one left he could ask about the day of doom. How it happened was an enigma he wished he knew, he didn't recall leaving while the Earth was dying, there was no news or anything for that matter. Everything was fine, it was a beamish day for his braggart self, perhaps not so much for his family given he never came back that afternoon. And it had been days or months, he lost count.

It was intensely dreadful, living in complete solitude without any wariness other than his slender body and his current ill-starred abilities. Reginald Hargreeves did prepare them to tear down crimes and save the world, all six of them had been trained for an occurrence that might be similar to this, but what would happen if there was only one person left to face it? And the rest have succumbed to this global destruction? What did he need to do next? Who did he need to save but himself?

Five had his fair share of crying, sorrow mingling with exasperation, screaming in bewilderment at what had gone wrong as darkness devoured the days. He was still a kid, after all. He used to think his abilities were what made his life more interesting, but now it was what he feared the most. The hazard of what this time travel could do sent shivers down his spine, it had yanked him away from his family as an example, though that was his own fault, he was too on an ego trip to admit it.

However today, more or less the two hundredth day, somehow it felt entirely draining.

Five sat on the ruins that were still standing crumbly, one flick would probably knock it down. He stared blankly straight at the vast surface that held only the remains of the life that once existed, his little red wagon rested on the right side, with Number Seven's book residing unshapely on top of the paltry goods he had collected. And Delores, an inanimate object plucked from under the rubble, the only thing that made him feel like he had someone, once again gawking in silence another tough day he needed to go through.

"What else should we look for today?" The question faded in the atmosphere, but he pretended Delores responded to it. No, he believed that she answered it. He had to, or else, the insanity that was starting to build up in the back of his mind would only run rampant. Five, after forming the remark she would say, glared at her. "No, stop with the equations, my brain is genuinely demoralised."

Five thought if there were beings outside Earth observing him, they would sense how badly he wanted to go home, to return to his family, to forestall their deaths—everyone's deaths, but he too had his own limits, with the terrain that did not support much, the lack of proper food and water, causing him to frequently suffer prolonged fatigue. He didn't give up, of course, but today probably was not the right time to be dwelling on numbers, coordinates, frequencies, or whatever else there was.

The boy was enormously exhausted, the hope within his soul was diminishing, and every fibre of his existence just didn't accept that this would be the end, something he would have to endure until the very last breath. He would try to bet on the modest conquest of his abilities for sure, but the amount of fear that swarmed his entire figure was also staggering. He was afraid he would end up in a worse place than this. But then again, what could be worse than being the sole survivor of an apocalypse that wasn't even supposed to happen to him yet?