[ Open rp post + TFLN overflown]

[n5]

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[emp4thy]

((continuing from here))

[Drinking directly from the bottle, yes. Also literally hugging the bottle with one arm when Number Five teleports in. Apparently, he wasn't feeling too depressed to drink it earlier: it's already two-thirds gone. There's also an unopened — and free of backwash — bottle sitting at the foot of the armchair Klaus is occupying.

At his brother's sudden appearance, he exhales a greeting, like someone being woken up out of a nap.]

Hey, welcome.

[n5]

Good evening.

[ Five was mindful to bring his own clean glass because he figured Klaus wouldn't have any. The view of his brother hugging his alcohol doesn't catch him by surprise but he unopened bottle does.

He grabs it but doesn't open it just yet, walking over to his sibling with a little frown on his face. Five tries to find a place to sit down but every surface is covered in clothes, magazines and...stuff. Lots of it. In the end, Five sits on the floor, cross legged. ]

Have you gotten any sleep lately? You look like crap.

[ Sibling concern, what even is tact? ]

[emp4thy]

[Well, hey. At least Five asks about his well-being before handing out observations. Some of their other siblings aren't so considerate.]

I don't sleep so well when it's raining. [The way rain patters on windows is surprisingly similar to the way it patters on wide jungle leaves.] And sometimes shadows look like things that aren't shadows. That can be a real problem.

[Oh, boy, is it not fun talking about this. Five is Klaus's best bet, he thinks, for actually understanding what he's been through. Doesn't stop the doubt from creeping past the edges of his thoughts — Maybe he never went through anything like this after all. Maybe I'm just weak.]

Do you ever have anything like that? [Or, to put it another way:] Did you, ever?

[n5]

[ Five can't promise he won't judge but at least he wants to get to know all the details about what or who is he going to possibly criticize. His fingers tap lightly on the glass bottle as he listens to Klaus' explanation. He might not understand the reason why it's rain what bothers him, but he doesn't need to. A trigger is a trigger and anything might bring awful memories or nightmares to the surface. Knowing rain upsets Klaus is enough.]

My window is smaller than yours, rain makes less noise. [ He says, which is Five's way of suggesting that Klaus can crash in his bedroom. His mattress is also against the corner and under a sloped ceiling, which means less open flanks. Might seem weird to other people but if you don't want unexpected visitors to catch you so easily, it's a lifesaver. ]

Ashes. [ His lips become a flat line and the corners turn downward after the question. This time Five work on opening the bottle before answering. He doesn't elaborate until he's filled his glass with the wine, letting it breathe. ] Smoke in general...I'm not too fond of fireplaces now.

[emp4thy]

[Ashes and fireplaces make sense. Like Klaus's, the echoes of Five's trauma turn up in scents and sights that remind him of that time.

And that leads Klaus to a connection he hadn't really thought of before now. It's not the fact that they've both traveled through time. It's what they experienced when they did.]

I guess I shouldn't really blame the briefcase. I mean, it was time travel. I could’ve been sent anywhere. I could’ve... landed in the middle of Woodstock, or the height of the Roman Empire, or Berlin before the Nazis, who knows? That could've been great!

[Okay, so time travel still would've been a mindfuck, and terrible things can happen anywhere, all the time. And, also: some places are just objectively worse than others.]

But no. I got sent to Viet-fucking-nam in 1968.

[n5]

The world burned for weeks, maybe even months, and then there was the smell of the rotting corpses that weren't immediately incinerated during the Apocalypse. It was the reason why Five stayed clear of the cities but the ash and grey skies were everywhere, it was suffocating. Sometimes, he can still taste it in his mouth. With that unpleasant thought in mind, Five takes a long sip of his drink.

The Commission sends their agents to important dates in the timeline to ensure that certain events happen the way it should and worst things don't develop in its place. I don't know why Cha Cha and Hazel's briefcase was set to that date, maybe it was going to be their next mission, but it wasn't a coincidence.

While it's not exactly a reassuring explanation, Klaus at least now knows more than most about the briefcase. Any place where he could have ended would have been important or dangerous in some way, it was always bad news.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Five would like to say it gets better with time but it's such a frustrating cliché in his experience that he rather spare both of them the embarrassment of hearing the words out loud.