𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐘 𝐌𝐂𝐅𝐋𝐘 𝐄𝐅𝐅𝐄𝐂𝐓 ━ five hargreeves²

8│A DARK, SAFE PLACE

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❛ ᴛʜᴇ ᴍᴀʀᴛʏ ᴍᴄғʟʏ ᴇғғᴇᴄᴛ​​​​​​​​​​. ❜ ° . ༄
- ͙۪۪˚   ▎❛ 𝐄𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓 ❜   ▎˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
»»————- ꒰ ᴀ ᴅᴀʀᴋ, sᴀғᴇ ᴘʟᴀᴄᴇ ꒱　


❝ YOU GUYS ARE SO WEIRD ❞

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The diner was only slightly crowded as Five, Vanya and Alexa claimed three seats at the bar and placed the newly-found Hargreeves purposefully in the middle. A waitress came by to collect their order and returned with a pot of coffee before she carefully poured three servings. Alexa knew hers would still be left in the mug.

"Leave the pot, dear," Five requested. "Thank you."

The waitress turned to go and muttered, "lippy little shit" under her breath as she shook her head. "Kids these days."

Then, the trio was left alone.

"You going to tell me what the hell's going on?" Vanya asked, breaking the silence.

"When you were a baby, you were bought by an eccentric billionaire." Here, Alexa snorted. She never knew why Reginald preferred that adjective. Five continued as though he hadn't been interrupted: "he raised you in an elite academy with seven other siblings with extraordinary powers but in the year 2019, in order to avoid an apocalypse, we jumped into a vortex and ended up being scattered throughout the timeline in Dallas, Texas. Any questions?"

Alexa leaned forward to catch Vanya's gaze. "That's how I ended up like this," she said, and gestured to her teenage body. "Because somebody can't control his powers."

Five turned to look sharply at her. "I wasn't the only one using my powers at the time if you can recall," he reminded her coolly. "Maybe you're the one who messed it up. Everyone else turned out normally."

The blonde blinked, stumped into silence. That was true. Even if she hadn't seen all of them in person yet, she'd seen their pictures. Everyone else quite clearly returned to their normal age. How had she never thought of that? She closed her eyes for a second as she tried to remember the last few moments of 2019. There had been a pull on her powers as the vortex strengthened but she'd thought that was just the effect of time and space.

Maybe that wasn't true, though. Alexa distinctly remembered her siblings appearing de-aged but she'd been the only one to stay that way. Her powers were a source of protection— from anything.

"Oh my god," she breathed out.

Vanya looked at her in confusion. "What?"

"It was me!" Alexa's eyes were wide. "My powers were in use at the same time the vortex opened. We all appeared de-aged but as my powers interacted with Five's, I became protected from time and space. They sort of all meshed together and prevented me from bouncing back to my physical age."

"Am I the only one who's lost here?" Vanya asked.

"So it wasn't me," Five said smugly. "Although your theory has no proof yet. We'll have to wait three more years to see if you grow." He paused. "You landed in 1960, right? Aren't you supposed to be eighteen?"

Alexa nodded. "Yeah, but I didn't take any pictures when I landed. I was a bit preoccupied."

She shifted under Five's calculating gaze. "You do look fifteen. I mean, I remember what you looked like."

Her head shot up to look at him. "You remember?'

To her surprise, his tone softened. "Of course. You were fifteen when I left. I wasn't about to forget that easily. You look the same now as you did then." He paused. "With, uh, different clothes of course."