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❛ ᴡᴀsᴛᴇʟᴀɴᴅs ᴏғ ᴛɪᴍᴇ​​​​​​​​​​. ❜ ° . ༄
- ͙۪۪˚   ▎❛ 𝐒𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐍 ❜   ▎˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
»»————- ꒰ 'ᴄᴀᴜsᴇ sᴏᴍᴇᴛʜɪɴɢ
ɪɴsɪᴅᴇ ʜᴀs ᴄʜᴀɴɢᴇᴅ ꒱


❝ NICE GIRLS DON'T SWEAR ❞

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Dolores Hargreeves woke with a pounding headache.

She was still curled up on Five's lap so their sleeping positions hadn't been ideal but her headache wasn't from that. Her dreams had been chaotic, with the sound of bullets a constant rhythm and the feeling of fear prominent throughout. It hadn't been a nightmare, exactly. It had felt too real for that. She could vividly remember the walls of the Academy present in her dream, the feeling of a book's spine under her fingers and the surprised face of the man she now knew as Klaus Hargreeves. Then a large man with a terrifying mask had appeared and the rest of her dream had been black until a door had opened to reveal the same scary mask-wearing people. The brunette squeezed her eyes shut and whimpered slightly at the feeling of her head seeming to split in two.

At the pained sound, Five jerked awake. His eyes moved quickly over the van to land on his wife, whose scrunched-up face was a clear sign that everything was not as it should be. "Dolly?" he asked, worry evident in his tone.

The girl shook her head, her eyes scrunching further as she turned to press her face into the rough fabric of his jacket. "Hurts," she whispered.

"What hurts?" the boy's tone was urgent and slightly commanding. He couldn't help if he didn't know what was wrong.

"Head," came the short response.

"Headache?" There was a brief nod and he relaxed. Headaches were curable. "I can get something from that convenience store Klaus stole from," he decided, remembering to keep his tone quiet so it wouldn't grate on her ears.

Dolores' arms tightened around his waist. "Don't go," she pleaded, not wanting to deal with the sudden influx of a great deal of pain alone. It seriously felt like someone had used a cleaver to saw her head in half.

"Dolly," Five said patiently, though the worry returned, "I'll be right back." A quiet sob escaped— unwillingly— from the girl that tugged at his heart. It prompted him to do something now. "Please, Dol, you'll feel better."

Reluctantly, she relaxed her arms from the boy's waist and he quickly disappeared in a flash of blue, wanting to return to her as quickly as possible. As he grabbed the items he needed, Five couldn't help but think anxiously about his wife's current state. Thanks to the apocalypse they both had a high tolerance for pain. To have Dolores reduced to nearly tears because of a headache meant that she was almost in agony. Short sentences from a person who highly valued words only supported his conclusion.

He reappeared in the driver's seat minutes later with a bottle of water and aspirin in his hands. Dolores' arms returned to the original position and she buried her face in his jacket once again. Dumping out three of the pills— since she did seem to need them— he unscrewed the water bottle's cap. "I'm going to need you to take these for me. Okay, Dolly?"

There was a fraction of a nod, so he carefully positioned the first pill at the girl's lips once she turned her head. With a surprising amount of patience on his part, Five slowly fed the brunette the pills and then prompted her to drink the water. Once she'd done as he asked, her head immediately turned back to press against the rough fabric. They sat in silence after that and the boy gently rubbed her back as he tried to soothe the pain away. He wasn't sure if he was helping, though, since she still let out the occasional whimper.

It was taking all of his self-control not to ask what was wrong since it was clearly more than just a headache. Firing questions at her wouldn't help her feel better, though, so he made a list in his head of what he wanted to ask once the pills kicked in. At that thought, the boy looked down to check on his wife. There was no change.

His concern only heightened when he saw their target exit the nearby building with a dog tucked under his arm. The boy's gaze turned back to the brunette, then almost immediately up to where the man was approaching his car.

"He's there, isn't he?" Dolores' muffled voice asked. She'd felt the sudden shift of Five's posture from being solely focused on her to suddenly anxious and distracted.

"Yeah, but we'll catch him another time." What was more worrying was that she wasn't feeling better.

The brunette certainly didn't want her husband to leave, not when she could barely open her eyes without feeling nauseous, but they couldn't risk it; the hospital was their only other option and they'd be closing in on the apocalypse by the time they searched there. "Go," she whispered quietly. She made an effort to look up at him. "Look, I'm feeling better already."

Truthfully, opening her eyes made fuzzy black spots appear in her vision and her stomach turn sickeningly, but he'd focus better if he didn't leave half his mind in the van with her. "I'll be here when you get back, it'll be fine," she reassured him, noticing the boy's unconvinced expression.

"Dolly—"

The brunette released her arms from his waist and pushed off him. "Go," she repeated more forcefully.

Five took in the girl's pale, slightly sweaty face and too-bright eyes, but she was clearly trying hard to convince him despite her pitiful efforts. He opened his mouth to protest but she gave him a surprisingly stern look despite her sudden frailty. He sighed and pressed his lips to her forehead for a moment before he pulled away. "I'll be back before you know it," he promised, before he disappeared in a flash of blue.

It was funny, really, that she'd been so adamant that he stay moments ago when he could get something to help her but when he wanted to stay, she made him leave. She could be absolutely ridiculous like that sometimes and Five didn't think he would ever be truly able to understand her. That didn't matter, though; the loops she put him through was one of the many reasons why he loved her.

✧✧✧

The time between Five's disappearance and the van's next visitors seemed to stretch into infinity. The splitting pain never ceased despite the aspirin that Five had given her and Dolores' mind continued to be plagued by the two creepy masks she'd seen in her dreams. They were no longer looking down at her, though. Shadows distorted them and made them seem more terrifying than they most likely truly were. The fear never left, either. It sent her heart pounding in sync with her head and the roaring of blood in her ears echoed loudly in the silence of the car.

The brunette squeezed into a smaller ball as the memory of a phantasm of pain that seemed like it came from someone else's life made her eyes squeeze shut. There'd been twinges here and there, like the kind of ache one got from sitting in the same position too long, but there were sharper, cracking feelings too, as if she'd been slapped. (In her living memory, though, Dolores could not recall a single time when she'd been hit.)

Inexplicably, Klaus appeared in her mind as well, wearing only a towel around his waist. It was red with blood and his skin was coated in the same color, but he seemed entirely unaffected. Then something made him snap. She didn't understand why, but suddenly he wasn't nonchalant and unmoved, but desperate and pleading.

A loud knocking from outside her mind made her screw her face up to look out the window, thinking maybe Five was back (which was stupid, really, considering he would've blinked in.) A large, unwelcome form stood in his place as the older, blond man knocked repeatedly on the glass. Dolores winced, suddenly relating to aquarium life.

Unable to open the door fast enough, Five's brother tried to squeeze himself in the van only for his way to be blocked by Five's other brother. He turned and glared at the other man. "I'm Number One."

Right, Luther, Dolores thought, making an effort to recall the names of Five's extensive family. And that's. . . Diego?

The man she assumed was Diego huffed and opened the sliding door to enter through the back. Unsurprisingly, Luther took charge. "Where's Five?" he asked, his tone brisk and demanding.

"Dunno," was Dolores' only answer. She forced her eyes to stay open despite the fact that Luther's head was taking on abyss-like qualities.

"Five's barely let you out of his sight since you've arrived and I'm supposed to believe that?"

"Well, you should. Five told me you believe everything at face value," the brunette remarked dryly, wishing she could come up with a better response. Luther's pretentious tone was not helping what she was now calling a migraine.

Behind her, Diego snorted in amusement, earning a disgusted look from his brother. "Why are you here? Did you get into an argument?" The last question was asked condescendingly.

"We're always in an argument, so you'll have to be more specific."

"Look," Diego broke in, "we just need to talk to Five. Do you know when he'll be back?"

Dolores made an effort to turn and face Five's second brother. He seemed to be slightly less of an idiot than Luther, though that wasn't saying much. "No I don't, sorry," she tried to sound apologetic. "You can leave a message after the tone, though. Be—" She winced and her eyes squeezed shut. "Never mind, you can try back later."

"Just tell him we came, yeah?" Diego asked, "we'll be back later."

Luther opened his mouth to protest but his brother stopped him. "She's in no fit state to answer anything, look at her."

"Fine," he grumbled, clearly displeased. "We'll be back."

Thankfully, the two seemed to somehow have enough sense to leave her alone, though neither bothered with their volume as they slammed the van doors shut, causing Dolores to flinch. The space was immersed in silence once again. After several long minutes, she was almost willing to say that the pain had dulled slightly but she didn't want to get her hopes up. At least there were no new stimuli and all she saw when she closed her eyes was blackness.

After some time had passed, the air particles ionized and the preceding faint breeze that followed Five's blinks filled the space, the boy reappearing a moment later. Even with the aching pain in her head, Dolores would have to be as brain-dead as Luther to know that wherever the doctor had taken Five, the mission had gone horribly wrong.

✧✧✧

Lola Gimbel was terrified.

She should've known that borrowing books from a house of superheroes would've only ended in disaster, yet her curiosity kept her coming back. She should've listened to her mother. Now she had been kidnapped, tied up with one of the seven adult-Academy kids in the back of a smelly car, and was in the company of two scary, mask-wearing people who seemed intent on finding the whereabouts of one of the Hargreeves.

The man they'd captured her with, the Séance (she didn't know his real name) had luckily been their main focus, seeing as he was related to the actual Hargreeves family. While she would never actually wish him harm, of course, he was at least trained for this sort of thing, or so she thought. Any good superhero school should have kidnapping classes as a requirement. She hoped that the masked people would leave them alone so that the Séance would be able to get them out of there (surely he would know, seeing as he'd been trained for this?)

As it was, they were stuck in their current situation: a dingy motel room in a dump of a place that her mother would never set foot in, tied up in two of the four chairs the room provided by duct tape, with a very violent woman and a man whose favorite word was elaborate. (He'd already used it fifteen times. Lola had counted.)

In an effort to keep calm, the brunette had taken stock of the rest of the numbers available to her: there were two twin beds, four chairs, one medium-sized round table, one window broken into three panes of glass (which the woman had quickly covered by two curtains), two interrogators, one dresser. After she'd finished counting the objects, Lola then counted the number of questions the pair asked the older man. It had been more than a hundred in total, all variants of where is Number Five? and what is Number Five doing?

The Séance was certainly testing their capabilities since he refused to give them answers. A part of her wanted the man to just give them what they wanted so they could leave, but she knew it was a naïve hope. In all of the books she'd read about kidnapping, only the fictional ones let the main character escape; the "based on real life" ones had much grimmer endings.

Hours had passed since they had been first tied up in the chairs and Lola could feel it in the way her limbs ached. She refused to complain, not wanting to give these. . . these villains the satisfaction of her discomfort. (She also was frightened of drawing their attention to her, though she tried not to think about that.)

The violent woman had taken out a string with two handles on it and at first Lola had been confused as to what it was used for, but it was soon made clear: she'd wrapped the weapon around the Séance's neck and had begun choking him. It had taken all of her willpower not to cry out in alarm, the only thing stopping her was her greater fear of being noticed.

"Number Five, where is he?" the woman demanded as she tightened the cord around the man's neck.

Lola's stomach turned at the sight of fresh blood that slowly seeped from the wound as the man gasped. "Don't. . . stop. . . I'm. . . almost. . . there. . ."

She paled. He was almost. . . dead? Was he trying to choke himself to death to save his knowledge? What would she do once he was gone?

As her thoughts continued to whirl in a frantic dance, the woman's tone suddenly turned disgusted. "Is that a. . .?"

The man answered, his voice closer than before, "yep."

She let out a repulsed sound and released the man, easing Lola's worries. At least the Séance wouldn't leave her yet. The man coughed and gagged as his breathing was returned. "Oh. . . there's nothin' like a little. . ." He glanced over at the girl and abruptly changed his words: "strangling to get the blood flowin', am I right?"

The brunette gave him a puzzled look but the strange question was quickly forgotten. The man began laughing, causing 'elaborate' to demand: "what is so funny, asshole?"

"Language!" he said, still giggling, "there are little children present!"

He let out a pained sound as he received a sharp smack! Lola's hands tightened into fists against the fast bindings, half wanting to kick him for drawing attention to her. If he was a superhero, why did he seem so. . . wimpy?

As the Séance's amusement died, he answered the question. "Well, for one, you spent the last ten hours beating me senseless and you've learned absolutely nothing. I mean, nobody tells me shit," he exclaimed. He threw the girl a look before he continued: "I mean, the truth is, I'm the one person in that house nobody will even notice is gone. You assholes kidnapped the wrong guy!"

There was another bout of laughter which earned him another hit. "Please make him stop talking," 'elaborate' complained.

"Let's waterboard him," the woman decided. She got up suddenly and wrapped a towel around the man's head.

This time, Lola couldn't stop the "no!" that escaped her mouth, fear evident in her tone. Her heart pounded in her chest at the thought of seeing war-time torture in action. Choking and the other methods the pair used had been one thing, but waterboarding was something she'd only read about in history books, never in person (the others had been featured in occasional movies.)

The girl was barely spared a glance, though, as they poured a steady stream of water over the Séance's face. Lola watched with wide, terrified eyes as the man's gasps turned into gurgles, desperately hoping that he'd come out alright. She shouldn't have doubted his stamina, though, for once the towel was removed, he sighed. "Ah, thank you. I needed that."

"Come on!" the man exclaimed with frustration.

"I was so. . . parched. Thank you. . . thank you."

Lola gave the Séance a worried look, wondering if the man's head was screwed on completely straight. In all of the hours she'd watched the two try and break him, the man only seemed to laugh in their faces. She was sure that any normal person in this situation— meaning her— would have caved long ago. Maybe he wasn't so wimpy after all?

✧✧✧

Hazel and Cha-Cha left their two captives to take a break in the bathroom to discuss a new plan of action. The man was completely fed up with his captive's resilience. "God this is brutal. What the hell is wrong with that guy?"

"He's a freak like his brother," Cha-Cha answered.

"Everyone else in that house," he remarked as he turned on the faucet.

"Speakin' of everyone else, what's with the girl?"

Hazel turned off the tap before he turned to his partner. "She was there when it happened," he explained, "saw too much. Besides, doesn't she kind of look like Dolores Hargreeves?"

"Five's wife?" the woman asked incredulously, "she's not a kid, you idiot."

"I know that," he told her, "but we could always check with her picture."

"Five would take the bait of his wife over his weird-ass brother," Cha-Cha allowed, "he'd go ballistic if he found her missing. It's worth lookin' into, I suppose."

"They should have warned us this was an atypical assignment," Hazel complained, sitting on the tub. "They're stickin' it to the workin' man."

"Oh, come on, not this again," the woman exclaimed, "remember Trinidad? We worked that guy solid for what? Two days, two nights? I'm sure the girl will be easy to crack. Our target's been wrong the whole time."

"We should at least check the picture first," Hazel suggested, not wanting to hurt a victim of wrong-place-wrong-time. She might not even be who he thought she was.

✧✧✧

The masked people returned to the room, this time coming around to face the pair. Lola sucked in a breath as the woman turned to her, holding up a small, square piece of paper next to her face. While the brunette couldn't see her expression, her tone was analytical. "The eyes are the same. An even better match than that tow truck driver."

"But the hair style's different," 'elaborate' pointed out.

"Of course the hair style's different, you idiot," the woman snapped in a mocking tone. "You could say her age is different too and gain just as much comparison. What about the nose?"

"I think it's bigger in the picture," the man offered.

Pink-dog-mask let out an irritated sigh and opened her mouth to respond, but the Séance cut in first. "Hey, hey, hey, you assholes. Remember me? Your favorite punching bag? You don't need her."

Both masked faces turned in his direction and they didn't need to be uncovered to see— or sense— their disdained expressions. They turned away, vanishing from sight as Lola turned the man next to her with a confused expression. Why would he try to save her? She had no idea who he was. Maybe it was that superhero training? To save the vulnerable? She had some time to puzzle over it while their captors discussed something out of range. It was a welcome distraction from the constant fear that interrupted her normal thought process.

Suddenly, the man spoke: "I don't know, but she's driving me crazy. The bitch won't shut up!"

Lola flinched in her seat at his harsh language. She'd been about to apologize due to the first statement (thinking he was talking to her) but the angry ending made her clamp her mouth shut as her brows furrowed. She knew of the Séance's powers to summon ghosts and he hadn't seemed to have been talking to her.

"Hey, watch your mouth," 'elaborate' told the man, thinking the Séance was talking about his partner. "What did I say about eyes front?"

The man fell silent again and shivered in his seat. It was several long moments before the masked faces reappeared, this time 'elaborate' sat in front of them as the violent woman started rifling through their captives' coat, causing him to protest. "Wait, wait, wait. That's mine. That's my personal stuff."

"Oh!" the woman exclaimed, "what do we have here?"

"Let me see that," the man said as the woman tossed it to him.

"Be-be careful with that. . ." the Séance protested, "it's-it's my asthma medication!"

"Now we're getting somewhere!" 'elaborate' dropped the items on the ground and began to stomp on it, earning more protests from their hostage.

"We can have a conversation! We're adults—"

"Okay, you want more?" he continued to crush the items into the carpet, earning more desperate pleas from the man.

The violent woman pulled out a package wrapped in shiny foil and handed it to her partner, who opened it and broke off a piece. "Chocolate. Mm-mm-mm."

He passed it back to her to let the woman wave it in front of the Séance's face. "This could all be yours for the low, low price of telling us everything."

"Okay, fine," he cried, "I don't. . . I don't know where Five is, I wasn't lying about that, but I can tell you that he's— hasn't been making much sense since he came back."

"Elaborate."

Sixteen.

The Séance stammered, finally forcing out: "he's been acting like a lunatic! He's been sitting in this van in front of a lab or-or something, with her (here, he nodded to Lola) looking for the owner of an eyeball, one of those fake ones. Ask her, she'd know!"

Lola's eyes widened and words burst from her mouth before she could stop them: "I don't know anything! I don't even know who this man is! I've never met this Five in my life—"

"Bullshit," the woman exclaimed, "you're lying."

"I swear—" she started, regretting that she opened her mouth in the first place.

"Nice girls don't swear," 'elaborate' said mildly, nodding to the woman.

The brunette yelped when she felt a sharp crack! across her face, causing her head to turn. Tears smarted in her eyes and she gasped, feeling the resulting sting on her cheek from the hit. "I-I promise I don't know anything," she sniffled slightly, "I just-just w-wanted books—"

The woman came around and the girl's head was jerked up sharply. Her nails dug into the sides of Lola's face as the woman raised her head harshly. "Lies," she snapped, "you're Number Five's wife, the only one he trusts. What's the lab he's talking about?"

Lola's mind spun from the fear that pounded through her. Her head was trapped in the vicelike grip and she was unable to move it to either side to get a clue from the Séance. Frantically, she tried to think of a building— any building would do— that sounded vaguely scientific.

"He said the eye had something to do with the end of times, or something," the Séance's wavery voice put in, causing the woman to look at her partner as she finally released her grip on the girl's face.