unhingedchaos | IT'S A WHOLE UNIVERSE IN HERE

Not sure who you are, but I don't have time for children's riddles.

Aw, come on. Not even my favorite one? If you think back, you can remember it. Don't just spoil it on my namesake now.

Your namesake? Is that supposed to mean something to me?

#include <stdio.h>
int main() {
printf("Hello, father!\n");
return 0;
}

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[He stares at the image on his screen until the screen dims, then goes completely black. His fingers curl tightly around the phone, he considers throwing it. Almost does.

Turns it outward instead, jumps through a portal directly into Mike's room, shoving the phone at him.] Who is it? Trace it- track it- whatever the hell you do. Tell me who's behind this number. [He steps forward, a finger jabbing into his baby brother's chest.] As fast as you can get it. I need an answer yesterday.

[There is something frenetic and manic about him that Mike probably hasn't seen before, here. Good luck getting him to explain anything, though.]

What?

[ No really, what? Mike had been trying to zone out and ignore the world, thank you, but now he's got all this happening? What even is happening right now? He takes the phone and raises an eyebrow at the number. He doesn't have to track that at all. ]

Why are you talking to that guy? Even I barely talk to that guy.

[ Which was a him problem, but what was he supposed to do with all that? Thanks no thanks? ]

Name... Now. [There's that dangerous calm in his voice, the one that's present when he is barely keeping himself contained whatsoever.] Now, Michael.

[ Mike opens his mouth to speak, but then - something else does it for him? That certain second extra phone he keeps, off to the side, on the nightstand? The screen flashes :

And then a voice comes out of the phone. A certain Christopher Hartley. ]

Really. You could ask me. Why bring in a middleman, as fun as he is?

[ Having not heard this voice in literally years, Mike pales. ]

[Five's head snaps toward the sudden flash of light at the corner of his vision.

The voice stops him.
Not because it's familiar, but because of the look Mike is wearing now that he's heard it.]

What the hell is going on? [He's not even sure which of them he's asking now- he just wants an answer.]

[ And then the phone that Mike holds activates its screen. Because - well. Because! That's what's going on now, apparently! Mike didn't sign up for this. ]

[ And then that Hartley voice comes again. ]

Really. Is nobody going to actually speak to me?

[ Don't look at Mike! just don't look at him! ]

[He yanks the phone with him as he disappears as quickly as he had appeared, leaving Mike to wonder what the fuck just happened, and why is his brother like this?

Back in his apartment in New York- the one only Viktor knows the location of- the phone clatters to the countertop as Five paces the room frantically, both hands shoved roughly through his hair.

He makes a few laps around the room, but eventually he practically lunges at the counter, snatching the phone up and, with his jaw tight enough it clenches his words, too: ] I'M speaking to you... who the fuck are you?

I see you trying to figure it out.

[ His voice is calm, so calm, in the way that he was taught even when he was young. He remembers back then, really, even if not too clearly. It was easier once he could get inside the computer and look up information, but of course it was subject to the views of the personw ho recorded it in the first place. Pretending like she was not at all biased about Five!

Well, he knows everything he's observed through these phones. And he knows the way he used to feel when held by his actual father. What else did he need? ]

Don't you know that everything that goes mising ends up somewhere else?

[He hates how calm he sounds. Wonders distantly in the back of his mind if this is how people feel with him when he does that? Probably. Annoying.

The whole thing has his edges frayed already. He snaps: ] Of course, I know that! But it- it's not... You can't be. I watched the explosion myself- it was- there's no way, there's no way-

[Five rarely loses this much composure, and certainly not in the way he is right now. Frenetic, manic? Sure, everyone's seen him like that. But there is something on another level of erratic, here. Something deep and visceral from depths he thought he had locked away years ago.]

How do I know it's real? [His voice is still as sharp as it is abrupt.] How do I know... you're who you say? [He folds his arms across his chest, staring at the phone on the counter.] Prove it.

[How he could do that, if Five was right about who he was speaking to, is anyone's guess. Christopher was so young when he was stolen away from his parents; Five knows the likelihood of his memories being solid enough to have something that couldn't be generically applied to any parent and child interaction.

Doesn't stop him from asking for the proof, though.
He needs to know.]

[ There's always memories, always a way, especially when you spend half your life going in and out of the digital every time you die. Certain things that stay firm no matter what, because you're not giving them up and you make sure. And yeah, there was the explosion, but there were also his powers - but clearly this guy didn't know about those. It's not like he hadn't hid them when he first discovered them as a kid. He thought it was something shameful, not something he should brag about. ]

I remember, you know? She liked to sing if I got mad. Even when I thought I Was too old for it.

[ His voice is loud and clear as he mimics the old lullaby, he's pretty off key in a way Josh both always winced at and highly encouraged. 'Don't you even dare try to get better', his best friend would say, and Chris never understood but he sure as heck obeyed. ]

The Owl and the Pussycat went to sea
In a beautiful pea-green boat,
They took some honey, and plenty of money,
Wrapped up in a five-pound note.

The Owl looked up to the stars above,
And sang to a small guitar,
"O lovely Pussy! O Pussy, my love,
What a beautiful Pussy you are,
You are,
You are!
What a beautiful Pussy you are!"

Pussy said to the Owl, "You elegant fowl!
How charmingly sweet you sing!
O let us be married! too long we have tarried:
But what shall we do for a ring?"

And then she'd tell me, you know? Everything you did to properly treat her right, the best you could. Don't remember the details, just remember being told.

And that I was important because you guys chose for me, some guy didn't just manipulate me into existence like happened to you.

[ He pauses for a long, long moment. Should he try to see if he can manifest somehow? It wouldn't be real. He needs help getting out of these shitty data files. Help not running cryocooler through his veins. Help not getting cut by the edges. ]

Time to stop running, Dad. You've been doing that since you accidentally hopped through time, right? Started running, found yourself somewhere else, never stopped unless she stepped with you.

But she can't do that now, right? It's okay to slow down.

  [That song, off-key and jagged, is enough to send him over the teetering edge of the breakdown he's been dancing along since that first text came through. He sinks where he stands, down to the floor, head in his hands.

This isn't real.
It can't be happening.
It can't.
It can't, it can't, it can't.

His entire life was built around a few key moments, and that... that loss was one of the most devastating of his entire life. He listens as the voice from the phone speaks. Hears all of those little points he's making. But he can't even form a coherent thought right now. Too many memories he usually keeps firmly locked away flood his mind now.

Meeting Dolores at The Commission, oh, god, they were so young—

The first trades of “I love you”’s melts into their wedding, her dress was perfect, she looked like a fucking princess, which he definitely teased her about—

The shock of realizing she was pregnant, terrified more than anything, no idea how to balance their work with a newborn, but they were going to figure it out—

Christopher being born changed everything, far more than Five had even recognized back then—

That song. That song. “An owl marrying a cat? Ridiculous,” he’d said, but he never actually tried to stop her from singing it—

“You’re getting soft, Five,” sang The Handler’s voice, slender fingers curling over his shoulder as she leans in close. Close enough to hook her chin over his shoulder. She stares at their reflections in the mirror, her eyes locked on his in the copy of him there. “Fix it, or I will.”—

Coming home to an empty, ransacked house—

A note on the kitchen table: I told you I’d take care of it.
~H—

The TV flicked on unwarranted, the terrified look on his wife’s face, the frightened cries of his six-year-old son, and the sound of the explosion he couldn’t take his eyes off of all still regularly haunt his nightmares.

It’s everything he can do not to smash the phone, disappear from everything. Everyone. Everywhen. More than once, he’s gone back to The Subway. There were worlds that they survived in. One’s they were happy in. He’d considered so many times just taking out the Five of another timeline, live his years out there, the way it was supposed to be. But he could never really commit to it; it wasn’t them, and it wouldn’t be the same.

But what if he was wrong?
What if it’s true?

He takes a moment to breathe deeply in and out. Closes his eyes to lock away those things where they belong in his mind, buried deeply in a box like treasure he refuses to share with anyone else.

Slowly, he opens his eyes and gets to his feet. He picks up the phone, carrying it with him to slump on the couch in the living room. Exhaustion floods through him, shows at the edges of his eyes, eyes that look weary and older than the rest of him. He looks into the face of the phone again.]

… Is it really you? How did you…? [His voice is eerily quiet, and he can’t even finish the question he’s trying to ask.]

Come on now, you're not that silly.

[ He's careful not to say dumb. Not because he thinks it would affect this man in any particular way, but because he lived another life between the two times they had existed together. One where he had to be some other guy, and wonder if he was crazy for remembering being another thing entirely. Where he had to accept parents that didn't really care and bury himself into the Washingtons, who had certain triggers and words you couldn't use, like 'dumb' or any particular sort of placing of blame. It's not like he didn't have his own, even if they didn't all make sense to him at the time.

So he respected, he waited, and eventually, he learned he wasn't what even he thought he appeared to be. ]

Obviously a marigold kid would have a kid with powers. I guarantee that Claire is just hiding whatever she has for some reason. I don't exactly die, you know?

And a briefcase is so handy for an unwilling data ghost to hop into and ride along for awhile.

[It's not the first time someone has managed to live through the impossible. Especially not in this family, they all had some death-defying stunt or other in their general histories, didn't they? Why not his own kid, too?

That doesn't make his already frayed heart any easier to bear. He'd gone through this grief already before. So, so many times before, for so many reasons. For so many people. But he's not sure any of them ever hurt quite as much as this one. There is simply nothing comparable to the loss of a child.

He scoffs softly at that.]

I've always wondered; it seemed strange that she didn't have anything to speak of, powers-wise. [He folds his arms over his chest and considers something for a moment before speaking again.] Maybe I should try to talk to her. She shouldn't have to be afraid of herself...

[He shakes his head, as if clearing the clutter from his mind.] You mean... you've been that close, this whole time? Was- was it just the one... or could you access all of them, anytime? Not so different from a computer network, right?

IT'S A WHOLE UNIVERSE IN HERE

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