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❛ ᴡᴀsᴛᴇʟᴀɴᴅs ᴏғ ᴛɪᴍᴇ​​​​​​​​​​. ❜ ° . ༄
- ͙۪۪˚   ▎❛ 𝐓𝐖𝐄𝐋𝐕𝐄 ❜   ▎˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
»»————- ꒰ ᴛᴇᴇɴᴀɢᴇʀs sᴄᴀʀᴇ
ᴛʜᴇ ʟɪᴠɪɴ' sʜɪᴛ ᴏᴜᴛ ᴏғ ᴍᴇ ꒱


❝ YOU'RE EITHER DUMB OR
DESPERATE. WHICH IS IT? ❞

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Dolores Hargreeves was extremely frustrated. No, scratch that— she was incensed. All she wanted to do was talk to Five: find out why he'd thought that breaking things off with her was the only way to go forward and share her feelings about what he'd done— and then kiss him senseless. (And, if time allowed, more than that.) But now the whole damn universe needed to be saved which put off that order of events from happening. So, the only logical conclusion was this: the faster they got through the Mothers of Agony, found Pogo, got the information they needed and completed the mission, the sooner she would be to jumping her husband's bones. (Okay, maybe there were still some lingering hormones that were affecting her emotions.)

Or, in other words: Dolores was there to take names and kick ass, and she was all out of names.

Perhaps her newly discovered air of fierceness was palpable as she and Five received many unfriendly stares as they entered the dive bar. (Or it was the fact that they looked like kids, but she preferred to think that it was the former.) A woman stood at the bar with a drink in hand called out to them tauntingly: "what you doing here, babies?"

The man next to her gave them an equally hostile look. "You lost, kids?"

Dolores stared back at him unflinchingly as they passed the pair. As they walked towards the back they passed by another woman, this one scantily clad in pink and leather. She moved fluidly against the pole without sparing the couple a glance. The brunette stared at her, too, as they went by her. (What? She was just establishing dominance— that was all.) Five pulled her forward without hesitation, too intent on their mission to be distracted by the sights around them.

They paused for a moment as they reached the back door before the boy pushed it open to reveal a dimly lit room. Under two fluorescent lights, a large man waited in the tattoo chair. A setup of inks and pens stood next to him along with a very familiar chimpanzee. Except— instead of suits and sweater vests that Dolores had last seen him in, this Pogo wore a leather jacket and had samples of his artwork displayed on his hairy arms.

"Been looking for you," Five announced calmly.

"I don't tattoo children."

"Swell, we're not here for the ink. We're here because we have a mutual friend: Sir Reginald Hargreeves."

Pogo pulled the cigarette out of his mouth and turned away from them. "Whatever he wants, I'm not interested."

"I don't think that you understand. I'm one of his children." Five paused. "From another timeline."

The chimpanzee froze as the boy's words surprised him. He faced the couple again. "Another timeline?" Then, he took a step closer to peer at the brunette. "Dolores? What are you doing with this boy?"

The girl offered him a smile in greeting; in the brief time that she'd known the Hargreeves' unusual butler, he'd always been kind to her. "I'm not the Dolores you know," she corrected him. "I'm from Five's timeline; take it as evidence that we're telling the truth. There's now two of the same person."

"That's impossible," he commented with a light scoff.

"As crazy as it sounds, if you were to go to the Sparrow Academy with this Dolores, you'd see that what she's saying is true. Not only that, but you and I have met before, back in 1963 when you were a diaper-wearing chimp in dire need of a manicure." Five pulled down the collar of his shirt to reveal the lingering evidence. "I don't know if you remember but I have a scar to prove it."

Pogo didn't seem to be convinced. "If what you're saying is true, I'd be talking to a man well into his sixties. Besides, your story does not account for Dolores' presence. If there are indeed two of her then why did I not injure her as well?"

Five let out a quiet sigh as his shoulders slumped. The guilt from throwing her recklessly into the past to survive an apocalypse without him— and then the following time she'd lived in the fifties and sixties— was still a heavy presence in his heart. Even if she had forgiven him for his arrogant miscalculation, he still hadn't forgiven himself.

Seeming to sense her husband's self-deprecating thoughts, the brunette answered for him: "there were some. . . complications. I wasn't able to join Five on that particular adventure— which doesn't help our case, I can see that— but this isn't something that we would lie about." Towards the end of her reply, her tone had taken on a harsh edge.

Unfortunately, their family friend decided he'd listened to enough of their nonsense. As their conversation had gotten more intense, men had emerged from the shadows to tower over the two teens. Now backed by muscle, the chimp gave them a dismissive look. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I've had a very long day."

Before Five could anticipate her next move, Dolores scoffed as she shouted after the chimp: "a long day?" she repeated mockingly. "Try having a long life, you ignorant bastard!"

"Dolores!" the boy hissed at her warningly.

She ignored him. "You know, I liked you a lot better when you wore suits and served tea!"

Five pulled firmly on her hand to keep her from visibly going after the ex-butler. Due to her outraged comments, the circle of men closed around them to keep the pair from following Pogo. They stared down at the teens menacingly, though some had a sick kind of interest when they looked at the girl.

"Time to go home to mommy, li'l guy," one of the lackeys rumbled.

Another one smirked down at the brunette. "But make sure you leave your pretty girlfriend behind. We'll treat her right— scout's honor."

A third biker chuckled as he glanced the boy up and down. "'Prolly better than you, inch worm."

The fury that had been simmering underneath the surface boiled over. Dolores didn't care what they said about her— Five would probably kill them before they even got a chance to do anything— but no one made a jab at her husband. She let go of the boy's hand to place both of hers on her waist. Her stance widened so that her feet were shoulder-width apart and she straightened to meet their eyes defiantly. "You wanna say that again, Taserface?"

She felt Five's hand grasp her wrist. "Dolores, no."

She irritably shook him off. "Dolores yes."

The man who'd first spoken gave her a teeth-baring grin— or it would've been, if he'd had more than ten. "You're a little spitfire, aren't you? I like that in a woman. Makes it more fun to tame them, if you know what I mean."

Dolores gave no answer to his comment except for meeting his gaze fearlessly. He took that as a sign to step forward— exactly what she was goading him to do. The man reached out and placed his hand on her shoulder. It was purely out of steel will that she didn't shrug off his clammy, meaty palm right then and there. Behind her, Five tensed as his hands curled into fists. While he'd been hoping to get out of the establishment without an altercation, he'd gladly punch an asshole in his wife's honor.

Before he could make a move, though, the brunette acted swiftly: once she'd lulled the man into thinking that she was defenseless, he'd moved within inches of her. Then, without warning, she brought her leg up and kneed him straight in the crotch. He crumpled to the ground with a grunt as he cupped the injured area.

The next man surged forward to avenge his. . . friend? Comrade? His hands were outstretched to give her a firm push but her form was more slender than he'd been expecting. She turned so that his chest met her boney shoulder, knocking the air out of his lungs in the process. As he went down, she delivered a swift punch to his face— though she was careful to avoid his nose to keep blood from spraying everywhere. This time when she used her fists, they didn't hurt as much as they had when she'd punched herself in the face when they'd first landed in this timeline.

Dolores would've kept rhythmically hitting the assholes using the techniques Diego had taught her but just after she'd encountered her third opponent, Five managed to snap out of his shocked stupor. He latched a hand to her shoulder and blinked out of the room. The brunette continued to swing punches at empty air before she realized what he'd done. She rounded on him with an irritated look on her face. "Five! I wasn't done!"

"You've never gone in fist-first, Dolly." He paused as he replayed the (okay, really hot) scene in his head. "Why does your fighting style look like Diego's?"

The brunette shrugged carelessly. "Maybe because I had your brother teach me in exchange for babysitting his not-son?"

As he registered her reply, a nearby motorcycle roared to life. The girl turned to see that Pogo was escaping into the night. Without waiting for the boy to answer, she walked away from him and approached a nearby biker. "Hey, we need your bike. It's an emergency."

He gave her a baleful look. "Think you have me confused for someone who gives a shit."

"I'd really like to meet a biker who isn't an asshole," Dolores commented nonchalantly. The man hardly gave her a second thought as he revved the engine over her words. She sighed. "I'm disappointed but not surprised." Then, she used both hands to shove him to off the seat.

The bike was larger than she was expecting but she managed to drive it over to where the boy was waiting. "Come on, let's go!"

"No way. I love you but you're a shit driver, Dol," Five protested. He tried to grasp the handle so she'd slide to the back.

Her hands remained firmly in place. "Uh-uh. I'm nineteen— I can drive legally. You can't. Besides, we're wasting time talking about this. Just get on the back of the damn bike."

His eyes briefly flicked up to look at the dark sky. "God, please don't let us crash. I'd really like to stop the apocalypse at least once."

Dolores huffed. "Jesus Christ. I'm not that terrible!"

"I'll give you a score if we make it to Pogo's."

✧✧✧

"Holy shit, I think I'm gonna be sick," Five groaned as they pulled up to a trailer that was located in a remote place outside of the city. He clambered off the bike and stumbled over to the edge of the forest. In an effort to settle his stomach, he wrapped an arm around his middle and placed a hand against the trunk of a tree while he took a few deep breaths in the process.

Dolores also got off their ride and gave him an unimpressed look. She'd driven all night and into the early morning; now the sun had risen well above the horizon. Her knuckles stung slightly from her fight yesterday but she knew that they would've felt a lot worse without Diego's training. She put her hands on her hips. "Really? We got here, didn't we?"

"But at what cost?" the boy whined— rather dramatically, in her opinion. "Seriously, Dol, who taught you how to drive?"

"You did," she answered flatly. "And you're a shit teacher. Remember when I convinced you to take those vacation days in '36?"

He closed his eyes briefly. "Not until just now. I shut out those memories because they were too traumatic."

The brunette rolled her eyes. "Yeah, well, you can't complain. It's not my fault that we crashed into that police car."

"I told you to hit the brakes!"

"You never taught me where the brakes were! I only knew which pedal did the gas!"

Five's nausea finally settled and he turned around to pin her with a flat look. "Then why the hell did you go faster?"

She huffed. "Well, I had to do something. We didn't even get pulled over this time!"

"Yeah, but I'm pretty sure that we hit every curb in the city on our way out," he countered. "I'm banning you from driving ever again."

The girl's expression became extremely disgruntled. "Why the hell are you smiling, you asshole?"

Despite their petty disagreement, the boy couldn't hide the quirk of his lips. Sure, he'd rather that they talked about what they needed to, but they were back on familiar ground: he'd never been happier that they sounded like an old married couple. It meant that whatever damage he'd done, it could be repaired. She'd even resorted to calling him names as she began to lose the fight— just like she'd always done.

Instead of saying all that, though, he shrugged. "No reason. Come on."

Rolling her eyes in an irritated fashion, Dolores followed him towards the trailer. A woman sat guard outside of it with a cigarette and book in hand. Her legs were crossed lazily as she eyed them boredly. "Can I help you?"

"Need a word with Pogo," Five answered easily. He slid his hands casually in his pockets while Dolores stood next to him, still with her hands on her hips. She met the woman's gaze with an equally unbothered one of her own.

"Ain't no Pogo here, Pumpkin."

The brunette was clearly not fooled by her lie. She stepped forward. "Look, lady—"

The woman stood, though they were practically eye level with each other so it wasn't very intimidating. "So I suggest you get your asses off my property before I call a truant officer."

"Funny," Dolores drawled. "But in case you didn't notice, it's Saturday: that means there's no school. Now—"

"It's okay, Tammy," Pogo's voice called from inside the trailer. "Let them in."

She smirked at the woman and dropped her hands as she brushed past Pogo's gatekeeper. Five followed close behind and up the steps before they entered the living space. The chimp tilted his glass to them, though she noticed that one hand stayed suspiciously underneath the table. She slid into the booth first and the boy sat next to her. The woman— Tammy— closed the door behind them and made herself comfortable on the couch in the back.

They'd barely settled into the seat before Dolores heard the telltale click of a safety being taken off a pistol. Her eyes narrowed at the ex-butler. It was a moment before he spoke: "you're either dumb or desperate. Which is it?"

The sound of Pogo getting the pistol ready to shoot was the end of the brunette's rope. Without hesitation, she shot up from her seat and placed her palms flat on the tabletop. Leaning over the barrier between them, she met the chimp's eyes fiercely. "Do you really think you can kill me, you bastard? For the record, the Wicked Witch of the West, a Minecraft cube and a twelve-year-old Indiana Jones have already tried and guess what? I'm still here to tell the tale. If you think that your puny little gun is gonna be the thing that ends me then think again, because this is how it's gonna go: you're gonna give us the information that we need and then we'll be on our merry way. Capiche?"

Pogo hardly seemed fazed by her threat. "Desperate it is, then." He turned the safety back on and relaxed his grip on his weapon.

Five had no idea where his wife's fierce attitude was coming from and— while he found it extremely attractive— he needed the chimp's cooperation rather than defensiveness. He gently tugged on her arm. "Dol, calm down. Easy."

Reluctantly, the brunette sat— though her gaze remained hostile. The boy reached into his jacket pocket and threw the scrap of skin onto the table. Pogo picked it up and examined it with interest. "That looks like my work but I never did that tattoo."

"Not yet, you haven't. I cut it off my one-hundred year old self."

He nodded. "Ah, let me amend my conclusion: extremely desperate."

"You would be too if you knew that the entire universe were at stake."

The ex-butler heaved a deep sigh. "So it's happened."

"What's happened?" Dolores asked. There was an edge to her tone but (luckily) she wasn't throwing herself across the table to fight the chimp anymore.

He didn't answer right away. Instead, he searched through the box that sat next to him. There was a rustling of papers as he moved things around until he found what he was looking for. "Ah, here it is." He opened a journal to a yellowed page. "Look familiar?"

The brunette leaned towards her husband to get a better look at the drawing on the page. Her eyes widened. "Hang on— I've seen that before!"

Five compared his scrap of skin to the design that was presented to them. "Yeah, here."

She shook her head as the memory from earlier that day replayed itself. She abruptly shut it down before it got to Klaus' death. "No, not just that. It was on a game in one of the suites in the hotel."

Pogo looked over at her sharply. "You've been to the White Buffalo Suite?"

The boy glanced towards her curiously. "What's the White Buffalo Suite?"

"It's a really tacky pink room with a white buffalo's head as the main feature," she explained. "There's also this really old game that Stan seemed interested in and it had this design on its console."

Pogo nodded with approval. "The Dolores from this timeline could learn a thing or two from you. Reggie was obsessed with these symbols. It's a sigil: a symbol thought to have magical powers."

Five scoffed. "Dad believed in science and facts. I didn't respect much about the old man but I respected that. Hoo-ha was not his thing. It's gotta have a rational meaning."

"I don't know," the ex-butler admitted. "He just referred to it as Project Oblivion."

That seemed to interest the boy, though Dolores had never heard of it. She suspected that his other self had mentioned the name. (He always seemed to know about things related to the survival of the universe.) "This project. I need to know more."

✧✧✧

"It was a kamikaze mission," the chimp finished up his explanation sometime later. "He was preparing the Sparrow children with the expectation they might never return. That's why I gave the children those pills, to keep them safe from him."

Five took a sip from his drink that they'd been served. "Well, my druggie brother just got him sober. Go figure."

"Then Project Oblivion is starting again and you are all in danger."

He tipped back the rest of the liquid in his glass. "Then I should probably get that ink. Complete the loop."

The brunette reached over to grasp his hand comfortingly. "Are you sure? I mean, there might still be time to house hunt for an alpaca farm up north."

Her entirely serious tone made him smile slightly. He gave her hand a gentle squeeze. "You're just worried that I'll look more attractive than you if I get a tattoo."

Her concern abated and she scoffed. "As if." Then, she smirked. "More like you should be worried that I'll find you too hot and won't be able to keep my hands off you."

Five's face burned and he quickly stood to take off his jacket in an effort to hide his reaction to her response.