#patch is on team fuck-the-apocalypse(-and-reginald)

[in-tua-deep]

Ok I totally want to hear more about this survivors au/Delores is real! How do the siblings handle having this different version of Five? Five may be better adjusted but he still has to heard his family around like a bunch of stray cats. What happens when Hazel and Cha Cha show up? How do they find out that Vanya causes the apocalypse and how does Five handle that revelation?!

here is the thing, i think the survivors au has the potential to be HILARIOUS

no one knows how to handle a well-adjusted five, and this absolutely includes the commission

So you mentioned Hazel and Cha-Cha?? Five in this au was not nearly as absolutely feral as he is in the show bc he knows how to interact with people - he was raised by a competent adult and a weird best friend and they occasionally saw other survivors as well

please picture old Five hanging around the water cooler and chatting with Hazel

the other funny thing is that Five is competent passing - he is well adjusted emotionally but functionally?? Hazel is out there complaining about dental being cut and office parties and budgets and Five is there sipping his drink having never filed taxes in his life. Five doesn't know what the fuck a dental plan is, he was a child soldier and then lived in an apocalypse.

So please picture for me Hazel being like "okay I know corporate wants us to keep what we're being paid to ourselves but fuck that, workers unite, what do you get paid as a legend old timer?"

and five is like "you're getting paid? i get to not get tossed back into the apocalypse, I think"

"but what about expense forms? what about medical care?"

"I'm like 80% sure i'm being experimented on, actually." Five says nonchalantly, "Don't get me wrong, my idea of medical care is fucked by being a child soldier but I'm pretty sure regular people don't have electrodes attached to their heads every time they get a checkup. Could be wrong though! My ex-dad used to monitor my brainwaves while I slept so like, my idea of appropriate shit is fucked, you know?"

This is a Five who was raised by Rick, he is polite to his coworkers. If Dot asked him if he wanted to grab lunch, Five would have gone and grabbed lunch with her or politely said that he couldn't.

Cha Cha only ever talks to Five when she wants to talk shop, so they've had a couple of conversations about weapons but not much else tbh, Hazel just tends to be more personable

So when they're sent after Five, Hazel is much more hesitant to kill who he perceives as a "work friend" and also is definitely thinking about all the times Five casually revealed a way the commission was being highkey shady about him, such as the potential experimentation, no pay, working under duress etc. He's much more easily turned against the commission because he's even more primed to say "fuck the commission" than he is in canon

Hazel out here like "how did Five break his contract when Five wasn't even being paid? I kind of want to read it."

Hazel out here like "I would unionize if I didn't think the commission was anti-union enough to send literal assassins after me if I suggested it :/"

meanwhile with the siblings

Five just. talks over them a lot and makes so much sense that it's actually really hard to argue with him, and he's weirdly considerate of his family's obligations

Like Diego is like "i have to go see Patch" then Five is like "that's great I'm proud of you buddy, it would actually be really handy to have some law enforcement read into the situation if you think she's up to the task. that goes for everyone by the way! If y'all have people you trust, more bodies would be super helpful I think"

the entire family, collectively, who have like zero trusted social links: uhhhhhhhh

Diego, with this weird permission, probably?? Does? Awkwardly attempt to read Patch into the situation? Patch is, obviously, like "what the fuck, Diego" but probably goes with him to the mansion (????????) because she's concerned and then meets his fucking whacko family with their superpowers and suddenly everything is 100% more realistic

Five is just like "yes hello I'm aware I look like a child, i'm actually in my late 50s or early 60s (apocalypse time amiright) because of time travel stuff. Yes I am Five Hargreeves who went missing in like 2002 or whatever. anyway it's lovely to meet you, i'm so glad diego has someone he trusts, and considering my sibling's shifty looks when i told them to invite anyone they trusted this genuinely makes me concerned that Diego is the most socially well-adjusted of them."

"That cannot be possible." Patch says, like someone who has met Diego Hargreeves.

"You haven't met the rest." Five says sympathetically, "In our defense we were raised in isolation as child soldiers."

"That... explains so much." Is all Patch can say to that, "But you seem..."

"I'm adopted." Five waves away.

"We're ALL adopted." Diego grits out, very aggrieved by this and also not sure if he likes the fact that Patch seems friendly with Five, or at least is listening to him?

"I'm double adopted."

However! With the recruitment of Patch, herding Diego becomes like 90% easier.

Honestly the worst to herd are probably Luther and Allison? Luther because he's Number One and resents Five taking charge and also resents Five's casual dismissal of Reginald and also suspects that Five (or at least the commission) has something to do with Reginald's death?

Allison because she is torn between following Luther and helping him and helping Five but also calling Patrick and Claire at every possible moment while ALSO trying to repair her relationship with Vanya. She's flighty - she'd bail on a Five-apocalypse-assignment if Vanya mentioned being hungry or if Luther called or anything like that

Vanya likes to be included and, if asked, would probably drop as many current obligations as she can. Like she would probably cancel her teaching if Five genuinely and sincerely asked her for her help, which he does because he's 100% sure Dolores would manifest in front of him and smack him if he dared even imply someone without powers wouldn't be helpful

Vanya is like "I'm not sure if i'll be helpful - I don't have powers ):" and Patch is like "wtf are you talking about - my superpowers are Gun, Backup, and Reading Comprehension and i am like the most useful member of this team right now"

Vanya gets a confidence boost just from hanging out with Patch honestly, I think they should be friends

Klaus is thrilled to be included are you kidding?? He says he does it for money but he's just happy to be there and also as one of the most emotionally intelligent siblings he is mildly concerned about the fact that Five looks like he's about to cry and also emotes

Five also gives Klaus positive reinforcement, hugs, and Five absolutely weaponizes the I'm not mad, but I believe that you can do better and I'm going to give you more chances because I love you and fully believe that next time you'll be amazing way that Rick used on him.

I feel like Five ends up saying something along the lines of "I understand that x is really important, and we're definitely going to look into it. Is it something that needs to be addressed right now, or is it something that can wait until after April 1st? If it can wait, I can write it down here on this list so we don't forget. If it can't wait then we can figure out a time to address it and help you" a lot

Like Grace malfunctioning and potentially killing Reginald?

"We don't have to make this decision right now." Five says patiently, "Because Grace is a robot, we have some options. Living with a robot who is potentially malfunctioning and homicidal is dangerous, but Luther saying that means admitting that Reginald might have made a mistake or error with Grace's programming or upkeep. I haven't been here for a long time, but I remember Reginald being very precise. Regardless, this isn't a choice between permanently shutting her off or not. We can shut her down temporarily until we can fully address the issue. We can ask and see if there is a 'system reboot' option or some sort of system check that Grace can undergo. We can try find and hire an expert to take a look at her programming to find the issue."

Five gives this speech while like, organizing the weaponry in the house on a table very nonchalantly

Five out here making buzzer noises at his siblings arguments like "yeah no that's a false dichotomy and a strawman's argument, want to try again?"

(Look apocalypse nights were long and they had games that were literally about arguing pointless shit like ranking types of chairs or the best way to break out of a prison without powers and things could get heated)

"Who died and made you boss?" Luther demands.

"Uh, the world? Were you not listening?" Five asks, looking very purposefully confused.

It gets even MORE delightful when Five reads Rick into the situation because a) he promised and b) his siblings really have like, no connections jeeze

Rick fully believes that this is his son from the future, like Five introduced himself, but Five skipped out on a few key details. Such as being adopted.

So Rick spends a solid chunk of time just staring at Five, who looks basically nothing like him, trying to think like, who is his mother ???? if we save the world will Five stop existing? why would I name my child 'Five'? Does everyone have powers in the future? was there like... a radioactive apocalypse? would radiation give future humans superpowers? when did my life turn into a comic book? am i even allowed to ask these questions? will knowledge of the future fuck things up?

and then when Five comes back and is like "what is up everyone this is my dad Rick who will be joining us, he doesn't have any memories of me thanks to time travel but if anyone is mean to him i WILL kneecap them"

"Your DAD?"

Five does kidney punch Klaus for saying that Rick is a DILF but otherwise everyone just is like, warily looking at this Normal Dad Man in confusion because?? This is the dude who raised Five, who they watched take out like an entire commission team by himself yesterday? He looks so. Normal.

Rick is very confused and like, wonders if he's supposed to be the team mascot? But Five keeps involving him and asking his opinion and in return Rick enforces snack breaks and makes everyone sandwiches and has gentle talks with everyone

Every time Five notices someone about to blow he just lovingly makes sure that that person is alone in a room with Rick

Luther ends up crying on the sofa with Rick gently patting his back as Rick calmly states that Luther seems like he's put a lot of time and effort into his family and making his father proud and that since Reginald isn't here to say it, Rick will have to be the one to say that he's proud and that they've been dropped into a difficult and stressful situation - so soon after Reginald's death when they're still grieving! - and he's doing so well

Luther, experiencing unconditional positive paternal regard for the first time in his life: i don't know why i'm crying so much

honestly this is just a comedy of juggling the gang, having impromptu therapy sessions and discussions, investigating the apocalypse and the eye, leonard trying to meet vanya continuously and failing because she's constantly surrounding by family or rick/patch, the commission trying their best to bust up the dream team/isolate Vanya/kill or remove Five, while Hazel lives out his romcom dreams with Agnes and also says "fuck the commission"

#HUH? #survivors au #well adjusted five au #long post #far tua long #five recruits rick to be team dad #rick is DEEPLY confused #but he's the kind of person that rolls with it #dolores probably ends up tagging along as well on at least one occasion #dolores and patch bond #five pretends that dolores is a new sibling and not his dolores #five calls rick 'dad' and it messes with everyone else #patch is on team fuck-the-apocalypse(-and-reginald) #vanya is never alone so fuck leonard #five finds out that vanya causes the apocalypse and is like #vanya: HUH? #luther: maybe we should lock vanya up - #rick: are there are any other possible actions that might be more appropriate in this situation? #vanya: i could try get more meds to take and we could address the powers thing after april 1st #vanya immediately gets validated that reginald sucks #even luther who has had multiple conversations with rick is like 'dad... didn't always make the best choices...' #everyone: :0 #hazel doesn't kill patch so he probably joins team anti-apocalypse at some point #hazel: why are you a child #five: oh you know i'm young at heart and all that #OH forgot to mention one of the main differences in this au is that five like properly grew up this time #so while he is inconvenienced by his body he's not so deeply uncomfortable or angry about it #just resigned #'this might as well happen' - five #five probably makes jokes about it as well

[general-cyno]

reading the umbrella academy comics was a wild ride

if you thought show!diego was bitter/angry boy do I have some news about comic!diego. who btw was in love with vanya and has pretty much 0 relationship with his siblings (dude doesn't even like mom it seems) plus there's no patch tho he's still very extra. thanks for softie knife mamma's boi diego, netflix

klaus being so depowered and not wearing lipstick in the show is a CRIME. comic!klaus died twice (almost died of overdose in hotel oblivion too but ben's ghost??? saved him!) in a row and met god who isn't a girl but an old cowboy from texas, levitates all the time and can't use his powers if he's wearing shoes, singlehandedly killed hazel and cha-cha and had a baby in vietnam

speaking of vietnam it wasn't just klaus who time traveled but luther and diego also came along. luther fucked off and lived in the jungle for two years

i didn't think i could dislike reginald more but then i met comic!reginald who btw is an alien

pogo is not the only humanoid?? chimpanzee around in the world

allison and five team up a lot

five and luther are biological twins. the comic equivalent to the commission threatened to kill five and luther's mom before she gave birth to them so five and allison had to complete five's original task to assassinate jfk

allison has purple hair

it's heavily implied that reginald and luther had something to do with ben's death. and that ben always did his best to please them

luther and diego fight waaay more in the comics and they space travel together in hotel oblivion.

five was genetically modified to be the best killer and can't age so he's currently stuck in his 10 yo body forever

comic!vanya is def way more bitchy and swears a lot. five shot her in the head to stop the apocalypse but she survived. mom and allison helped her get better

there's a lot of villains????? and more adventures of the team when they were kids

like the show is pretty tame in comparison and I loved how it clearly took stuff from both apocalypse suit and dallas while adding its own touch and adapting it to be more tv friendly.

#reading the comics was an experience #can say i still loved comic klaus a lot but can't say the same for comic diego lmao #five is just so much and comic luther is even less tolerable (for me at least). #allison's still great tho more aggressive i guess? and white. vanya idk she's just different from the show #the umbrella academy #tp #long post

[in-tua-deep]

Oooooo the red bock au sounds so interesting! Does Five caught himself thinking of his brothers just as numbers and weapons like Reginald talks in his book? Does he read Vanya book to remind himself that they are still human even though he reads it through lens of someone hurt by them all? And I feel like the handler would know either way about the books but o it's so much fun to see five being paranoid

I think having both books and both perspectives reminds Five that... he’s getting some very biased accounts of his own siblings. I think that when he’s still young, he writes down as many memories as he can remember because... he starts to forget, at some point. 

Vanya’s book talks about how volatile Diego and Luther’s relationship is, and so Five writes down the time Luther and Diego teamed up to toss Five off a balcony when Five kept switching the pens in their hands with pipe cleaners during a lesson (and he will maintain until his dying day that he was just practicing his control, c’mon guys!)

when Reginald’s notes call Allison an “insufferable, narcissistic creature,” Five remembers Allison bribing him to cause trouble and distract Reginald so that she could use the microwave unobserved to heat up some water bottles as makeshift heat packs for Luther’s sore muscles

when Vanya calls Ben “easily manipulated,” Five recalls Ben arguing theories with him at 2am after one of Ben’s training sessions where Ben almost flipped his bed when Five jokingly suggested that he could use the horror’s tentacles to bounce up and down like a pogo stick before Ben tackled him and tried to beat Five to death with an encyclopedia of sea creatures (affectionately)

I think having Reginald’s journal actually helps in a lot of ways, because Five automatically autocorrects literally all of Reginald’s thoughts to be like, mostly inaccurate and much harsher than they need to be. So when he reads Vanya’s journal he also autocorrects and is able to recognize that it is a very biased and somewhat harsh view of his siblings

(he doesn’t distrust them as much as he does in canon, with only Vanya’s harsh words to cling to with no reminder that they were all raised by a man capable of unfathomable cruelty, no reminder that authors can be oh so biased)

outside of his equations, there’s notes to himself written in the margins of Vanya’s book. Sometimes they’re just small, pointing out that Klaus had fought to include Vanya in trap week (Klaus then proceeded to team up with her and managed to catch Five in a snare - he actually still has a scar around his ankle from his upsidedown thrashing before he managed to steal one of Diego’s knives to cut himself down) or pointing out that Luther’s chilly attitude when they were ten was probably the result of Vanya outperforming him in every standardized test they took because of Luther’s ridiculous inferiority-superiority complex

at the very least he has comparison, because Reginald’s book calls Klaus an absolute failure while Vanya’s book called him “sweet, as a child at least”

As for the Handler... she’s aware that he has Vanya’s book and a red notebook, but I don’t think she actually knows what’s in the red notebook! Reginald was notoriously secretive, after all

So the Handler assumes that the red notebook is where Five keeps his time travel equations because aw, he hasn’t given up! how cute!

She makes an assumption that, logically, makes sense. Of course Five is still trying to figure out time travel, no matter how much he denies it! Of course he’s writing the equations down! What a silly boy, thinking that he could hide this from her, of course she knows about his little plans to save his siblings ;3c

And because she’s so powerful and knowledgeable and one step ahead all the time, she makes an assumption and assumes that it is fact. Because she’s so smart, of course she isn’t wrong! She’s had Five clocked from day one!

(The Handler thinks she has Five all figured out, a creature so based in sentiment. Why would he carry a book around that details the torture his siblings went through? He hates his father, why would he ever carry around his father’s notebook! The Handler has a fatal flaw, and it is that she doesn’t understand loyalty and sneers at sentiment and those are two of Five’s most powerful driving factors. Five lives for his siblings and would die for his siblings, almost his entire life has been dedicated to saving them. Not the world, just his family.) 

(She understands that Five considers his family to be exceptionally valuable, but doesn’t comprehend that Five is 100% willing to die for them should it come down to it. Why on earth would anyone value something like siblings over their own life? Absurd. I genuinely believe that the Handler thinks she could get Five to betray his siblings with the right leverage, and so she fundamentally does not understand Five as a person)

To be fair to the Handler, the whole academy’s morals and just. completely and utterly fucked. Luther condemns the murder of innocent civilians even if it would save the planet but doesn’t blink an eye at killing the ‘bad guy’ Commission agents. Diego stabs criminals as a pastime while still holding himself at a moral high ground for saving people, despite the fact that too many criminals are forced into crime by unfair circumstances. Allison used her powers to bolster her career without even blinking but now refuses to use her powers at all because of the manipulation of one (1) child, not even against ‘bad guys.’ 

I mean. Vanya wrote an entire salt book without consulting her siblings that had lasting impacts on at least one of her sibling’s career in the public eye and potentially impacting her siblings relationships with everyone who had every read the spark notes on her book, without the opportunity for reprisal. Publishing your entire family’s dirty laundry as personal emotional catharsis is... kind of a dick mood, lets be real. Especially when you were all abused children raised in an environment of excessive violence and rigid structure. 

Like yeah, of course Allison is good at manipulation and lying - she grew up with an abusive and over-controlling father. She probably lied as easily as breathing about where she’d been, who she was with, what she was doing, etc. The only privacy they got in that household was what they seized with their own hands and carved out for themselves! Is it fair to say that Allison’s superpower is dishonestly?

Is it fair to say that Klaus got crueler as he grew? He was tortured and turned to drugs as an unhealthy coping mechanism, and then he sat down at a table and looked at all the other little kiddies who did not get locked into a crypt overnight. In fact, there was one child who never got any extra training at all! Can you imagine the jealousy? The bitterness? Klaus might have been exceptionally cruel to Vanya as a teenager, she had everything he wanted and dared to complain about it. Can you imagine listening to someone wistfully wish they could join in on missions when you know that the cost for doing so has been carved out of your soul?

My point is, none of these little bitches have anything that resembles a sane moral compass. They’re unpredictable as fuck! It’s like herding cats! You never know what they’re going to do next! Oh? Are they going to investigate in any logical pattern? No, because Diego just remembered Patch exists and helping her print flyers for the annual police ball is more important than saving the world or whatever lol

Luther is over there investigating the moon! The moon! Meanwhile Allison is breaking and entering her sister’s student’s house because she got shady vibes off of him one time and she has never heard of a proportionate action in her life. 

Meanwhile Vanya is going through the phone book trying to call up psychiatrists who have any familiarity with whatever fucked up meds Dad put her on because like, she would like to Not Be On Them (fuck you dad) but also understands that danger of quitting cold turkey something you have been taking for years and would like a professional opinion on how to safely decrease and eventually eliminate her usage, thanks (Klaus is hanging over her shoulder pointing out the ones who will sell you non-prescription drugs for a price and Vanya mentally crosses those ones off of her list to call)

Five is probably joining on the breaking and entering because Allison promised she would sweet talk to eye dude if he did her this solid 

(Five complains at length about how investigating the apocalypse should not be a solid because she would 100% die as well if the apocalypse came to pass)

#the red book au #plus like. some thoughts and opinions lmao #look Vanya's book was healing and cathartic for her #does that mean it should have been published? #FUCK NO #it's biased as all fuck for starters and could genuinely impact her siblings jobs and relationships #anyway the hargreeves are all cats #they do their own thing regardless of what they should be doing #their orders of priorities are fucked tbh #what do you mean vanya's job isn't equally as important as saving the world? #she has to pay rent somehow five !! #klaus is down to go threaten a seedy dude but can they investigate dad's will after pretty please? #maybe there's a clue! or numbers about inheritance! #if dad disowned them then diego is forging the will tbh #not because he wants the bastard's money but it's the PRINCIPLE of the thing #Anonymous #long post #far tua long

[in-tua-deep]

20 for Vanya?

20. What-ifs/Alternate Timelines

I have a lot of what-ifs and alternate timelines for Vanya lmao, especially ones that prevent the apocalypse because I’m a sucker for a happy ending tbh

What if Vanya was included? Why not? Klaus’s powers weren’t useful for missions, Allison’s story for Claire was literally like “yeah Klaus got distracted by ghosts in the background lol” so it’s not like a kid without offensive powers couldn’t do it

you have rebellious Vanya aus, where she decides, like some neglected children do, so act out. If her father isn’t going to acknowledge anything good about her, she’s going to make him acknowledge the bad. Punishment might be the only time he pays attention to her, after all.

(let’s call this an au where the pills suppress her powers but not so much her emotions)

So you have an au where she sneaks out and joins the missions. She breaks into the mausoleum and picks Klaus up and stares her father down with a challenge in her eyes. 

Five vanishes, and Vanya gets worse. She plays her violin at 2 in the morning. She refuses to eat her broccoli. she teams up with diego to see who can piss dad off the most

(her and Diego actually get along very well in this sort of au, honestly)

Vanya gets out and plays the violin and gets angry. She plays with fury and fire and gets second chair, because Helen is actually really very good. But she makes Helen work for it. Helen isn’t secure in her position, she always knows that Vanya is a step away from taking it from her

and maybe that should make them enemies, but it doesn’t. They’re rivals. Helen respects the hell out of Vanya, and Vanya can’t help but admire the woman who makes the most difficult pieces look effortless

(RIVALS TO LOVERS: VIOLIN EDITION)

Vanya writes her book. Except she kicks down Diego’s boiler room door and is like “DIEGO”

“WHAT”

“I WANT TO WRITE A BOOK ABOUT HOW MUCH DAD FUCKING SUCKS”

“I’LL BE RIGHT THERE”

as one of the rebel kids, Vanya actually got along well with Klaus as well since she helped him sneak out and 100% also smoked at least some weed with him because it would piss off Reggie tbh though she didn’t get into the harder drugs like he did

(showing up absolutely plastered to breakfast when they were sixteen was hilarious even if the laps they had to run around the block were not)

anyway Klaus crashes at her apartment sometimes, with supervision, because she loves Klaus but he has a problem and has stolen from her before but he’s still her brother but regardless

Klaus-Diego-Vanya sleepovers where they brainstorm the book to shit talk their father. Honestly it’s kind of a blast. They all get super wine drunk and end up watching Mary Poppins together with some Very Loud Opinions about nannies in general tbh

klaus throwing popcorn at the screen: BOO WHY WAS OUR CHILDHOOD NOT A MUSICAL???

diego: idk if you can have cheery musicals about child soldiers

vanya: i mean if they can have a musical about child labor in factories and the starvation of the workers in oliver twist you could do something with child superheroes

klaus: EXACTLY thank you vanya

they publish the book (luther is uNHAPPY, vanya dedicates her book to ‘all my siblings who survived the Reginald Regime but especially those who didn’t’, and she gifts Reggie a copy that says “fuck you lol” and is signed by her, diego, and klaus), they continue living, they go to the funeral when reggie kicks the bucket

and then five shows up, feral and aching

and five tells vanya about the apocalypse, and vanya thinks about their father saying time travel messed with the mind, and then she thinks - fuck the old man he was wrong about her (ordinary, fuck that, she’s Vanya Fucking Hargreeves) and he was probably wrong about Five, too

and Five is wholeheartedly believed

“Let me call Diego,” Vanya says when Five tells her about the eye, “I bet he could totally wear a police uniform and get info about the eye. And if not, I’m absolutely sure Klaus could improvise a solution. He’s good at that.”

“Klaus??” Five asks, vaguely suspicious.

“We don’t talk about the Sleepover of 2012.” Vanya intones solemnly, and refuses to answer any further questions on the topic.

Harold Jenkins comes to the apartment and tries to woo Vanya or whatever, and Vanya is kind of like... “Look, Leonard. I can be your teacher for violin. It’s my job. But I am in a relationship. And also like, super gay. If you have a problem with that then I am not the teacher for you.”

Actually scratch Diego and Klaus getting called, which they do, Vanya looks at them and her thirteen year old brother and is like “wait. actually i know someone infinitely better to crack this case wide open.”

“Who?” Five, Klaus, and Diego all ask

“My girlfriend.” Vanya says proudly, called Helen up.

And Helen walks into the building like she’s at fucking war and has such demanding confidence that they just give her the information she seeks and apologize for inconveniencing her.

“Hey Vanya are we still on for date night tomorrow?” Helen casually asks after, and Five kind of wants to be her when he grows up honestly after watching her verbally eviscerate Lance or whatever the fuck his name is

“Yeah.” Vanya confirms, “Unless there’s other apocalypse stuff to do?”

“You take all the time you need, honey.” Helen says warmly, “After all the more time you take the less you have to practice.”

“I’m gonna destroy the concert piece and you know it.” Vanya threatens.

Helen sniffs, “Okay, whatever you say second chair.”

and then they kiss and Helen ditches and the others just kind of look at Vanya judgingly

“In fairness, she’s very hot and very talented.” Vanya defends herself.

Klaus nods sagely. Vanya nods back. He gets it. 

“Concert piece?” Diego asks, because he has priorities.

“Yeah, I’ve already asked for tickets for all of you and you will be attending Diego.” Vanya smiles prettily with all her teeth.

“When is it?” Five asks

“April 1st.” Vanya tells him, “And no that isn’t an April Fools joke. You will attend and you will marvel at my skill. And maybe run interference between Helen and Allison because I’m kind of afraid they’re going to rip each others throats out to establish dominance.”

“That’s the day of the apocalypse.” Five informs her.

“Not on my goddamn watch.” Vanya says, because her family will attend her fucking concert and they will make awkward small talk with her girlfriend and the fucking apocalypse has better lay down and get over itself because nothing can stop Vanya’s goddamn plans

“I can investigate Meritech more.” Diego offers, because Lance-or-whatever-his-name-is is clearly shady as shit, “I have police contacts I could go through. Hey Vanya, your concert tickets include a plus one?”

“They can.” Vanya shrugs.

“Sweet, let me see if Patch can come.”

“She’s way too good for you, bro.”

“Shut your goddamn mouth.”

Anyway the point is they all go home, and Diego goes to talk to his police contacts and Five is definitely at home for when Hazel and Cha-Cha attack the mansion, oops. 

“Whomst the FUCK.” Vanya yells, kicking Hazel in the crotch because she’s Vanya Fucking Hargreeves she knows self defense thank you very much

“Ah.” Five says. “Hazel. How’s it going.”

“Just peachy.” Hazel wheezes, “Why’d you betray the Commission?”

“Well, you know. They cut the dental. That was really the last straw.” Five says, sarcastically.

“The dental.” Hazel echoes back, nodding very seriously, “I fucking know. You know physical therapy isn’t even covered anymore?”

“No shit?” Five says, “I mean you’d think with a job as physical as ours...”

“I know.” Hazel howls, vindicated. 

“Five.” Vanya says, rolling her eyes, “The house?”

“Oh, right.” Five frowns, looking at Hazel, “I mean. Can you like, leave? And not come back?”

“‘Fraid not.” Hazel actually sounds somewhat apologetic, “You know what the Commission is like. They’re really gunning for you.”

Five nods, because really what did he expect, “Can you leave like, temporarily? I mean you’d pretty clearly outnumbered. I don’t even know where Cha-Cha is, but judging by the furious yelling she probably met our sister and brother and Luther is hard to kill. Trust me, if he wasn’t we would have killed him when we were like, eight. But for real, can you get out of our house? I mean. Storming the den? Seriously? What kind of information did they even give you?”

“They didn’t give us any information.” Hazel responds back, sounding appropriately outraged, “They didn’t even tell us you could teleport.”

“Well that’s just rude. You’d think they wanted you dead or something.” Five muses, “But seriously, get out of my house.”

“Yeah, that’s fair.” Hazel admits, and leaves, because honestly Hazel is chill like that and knows when he’s lost. And Hazel also has a lot to think about. Like the fact that the Commission sucks and doesn’t even have dental, and how pretty the donut lady is. 

and Vanya is just like... okay. Weird. Is that going to happen again? Probably? I mean. Okay, this day has already been so goddamn weird. This week, honestly.

And they keep getting attacked by the Commission. And Vanya finds out someone broke into her apartment and stole her meds. What the fuck. 

“Did your shitty assassin friends do this?” Vanya asks, waving an empty pill bottle.

“Why would they?” Five asks, honestly confused.

“Because they’re assholes?” Vanya says, honestly outraged.

“You got me there.” Five admits.

The combined forces of Diego-and-Patch (because Patch is actually thrilled that Diego is asking for help regarding an actual fucking crime) figure out that the eyeballs are being sold illegally

Klaus is not kidnapped so he’s fine, just tagging along and living his best life, however this also means that Klaus does not steal the briefcase and Hazel and Cha-Cha are fine

Vanya keeps Five close at hand because frankly she doesn’t want him to leave again and she did really miss him. Also if she does save the world she can lord it over Helen’s head forever. 

And so Five is around when Vanya’s powers manifest, probably because they just got targeted by commission goons again because they’re trying real hard to kill five and separate Vanya

“Holy SHIT.” Five says, very intelligently, “You have POWERS.”

“Wow. Gonna have to write a fucking sequel to the shit-talking-dad book.” Vanya says, honestly a little light headed.

And then Vanya finds out her powers are sound based.

“Oh no.” Vanya says, “Where the fuck are my pills. I am not relearning how to play the violin with-powers a few days before the big concert Five, what the fuck.”

“But you need to learn to control them!” Five protests, “They’re your powers!”

“They’re a goddamn inconvenience is what they are.” Vanya states, “I mean, what am I going to do with them? Stop a bank robbery with the Umbrella Academy? Yeah, no thanks, that ship has sailed and sunk to the bottom of the ocean Titanic style. I’ll figure them out when I’m not in danger of blasting the audience halfway across the continent.”

“Yeah.” Five admits, “That’s fair.”

“Besides, if I’ve been on that shit as long as I have, and it’s been a long time, I cannot even IMAGINE what quitting cold turkey will do.” Vanya points out, very sensibly, like a siblings who has watched Klaus go through withdrawal symptoms more than once.

“Maybe there’s extra at the manor?” Five suggests, “Pogo probably knows.”

“Oh yeah I bet Pogo knows something.” Vanya mutters maybe a little bitterly.

They go back to the mansion and the Commission is honestly pulling their hair out tbh, and they ask Pogo who kind of pales and is like “UHHHH YES I CAN GET VANYA EXTRA PILLS” and goes to get them from whatever stash

“Fucking sweet.” Vanya whispers, entirely done with this situation, “The only adult male role model I had and he hid my powers from me and betrayed me. Love that for us.”

Five shrugs, “I mean, you’re right. All of our adult role models were all kinds of fucked up.”

“You vanished when we were 13.” Vanya says, “Didn’t you find like, any other adults ever?”

“Oh let me tell you about the Handler.” Five says, and proceeds to do just that. Because let’s be real, the Handler was the only human interaction Five had after forty odd years alone it was pretty damn important

Vanya, on the other hand, has strong plans to eviscerate the Handler should the two ever meet because Five deserved way better than to be forcibly made into an assassin?? honestly fuck that woman

that’s it that’s the au

Vanya finds out she has powers and is like “i have a LIFE i don’t want to interrupt it with bullshit POWERS,,, also going cold turkey off my meds seems like a bad idea if I don’t want to deal with withdrawal symptoms during my concert for fucks sake, my gf would never let me live it down if i skipped”

so vanya takes her meds, does NOT destroy the world, makes every one of her siblings go to the concert and even invites Hazel and Agnes after Hazel betrays Cha-Cha to join team No-Apocalypse. 

and then introduces them all to her girlfriend

“Holy shit Vanya.” Helen deadpans, “Your family is all kinds of fucked up.”

“I know.” Vanya says, aggrieved, “It’s been a long fucking week. Want to go camping and help me figure out my cool sound based powers? Bet they’ll make me a better violin player than you.”

“I think the fuck not.” Helen hisses, always up for a challenge, “Let’s do this. Me and my violin vs. you and your dumb baby powers. You’re on.”

“FAMILY CAMPING TRIP.” Klaus hollers, with all the enthusiasm in his little heart.

“Holy shit this is going to be such a disaster, I just know it.” Diego mutters.

“Shut up, it’ll be nice.” Allison says, elbowing Diego with her pointy pointy elbows.

“It’s going to be a shitshow.” Vanya says serenely, because it is. That’s just who their family is. 

Wouldn’t have it any other way, though

#rebel vanya au #vanya is a rebel with a cause #she's GAY she's got POWERS and she's NEW IN TOWN #vanya discovers her powers and is like 'nope no thank you' the au #i mean vanya was ALMOST like that in canon honestly #vanya and helen are enemies to lovers 500k slowburn orchestra au #vanya plays an extremely complicated piece flawlessly and then helen makes out with her in the concert hall broom closet #helen: i can't NOT fuck her #helen finds vanya's competence and confidence extremely sexy and it keeps her on her toes #vanya is honestly the same tbh with a side helping of 'my girlfriend can DESTROY you' #diego and vanya have matching 'reggie sux' friendship bracelets #allison would like to have a sibling relationship with vanya #allison: you could do better than helen #vanya: hell yeah I can i will wrench first chair away from her #helen: OVER MY DEAD BODY YOU WILL #vanya: I HAVE POWERS NOW JUST TRY ME #and then they make out and allison is left going... what?? #far tua long #long post #ask game #headcanon game #Anonymous

[in-tua-deep]

What animal do you think suits each of the umbrella kids the most?

okay what you don’t know is that i’m a sucker for a his dark materials au with daemons so i’m sorry if that’s not what you want but that’s what you’re getting lmao

forewarning: this is super self indulgent and i only have actual reasons for like maybe half of these 

Luther: a dog! If you want specifics probably an Anatolian Shepherd dog bc they’re big motherfuckers and muscular as fuck. I did toy with a big animal like a bear but ultimately I think a dog just because simply: Luther obeys Reginald without question and has incredibly loyalty to a man that never cared about his wellbeing. Plus, you know, the family would rib at him about being Reginald’s loyal dog and all that. Plus it’s a good set up for his rivalry with Diego that I’ll yell about in a minute. 

So yes, Luther’s daemon settles as a bigass dog. She’s pragmatic and can be cold and often tries to model herself after Reginald’s daemon. She can be somewhat self righteous and very blunt. She tends to say exactly what she’s thinking without sugar coating it and doesn’t care if Luther has to stumble to save face. “You think one of us killed dad.” Diego says. “No not ‘one of you’, specifically you, Diego. You have an alibi?” Luther’s daemon says in front of the family, god, and Five’s portrait on the mantle.

Diego: a wolf! This sets up a big rivalry between Diego and Luther as they have somewhat similar daemons except for the fact that Luther’s is a domesticated canine and Diego’s is a wild one. Luther often uses Diego’s daemon to say that Diego is too wild to lead the team and that’s why he’s in charge. It’s mainly because while Diego does his whole lone wolf act, he’s shown to be pretty protective of the people he considers his and really he does need a pack. Even though he tells Klaus no, he doesn’t bother enforcing it when Klaus insists on hopping in the car anyway. He wants to be leader of the pack, but is awkward when he tries to be in charge bless his heart.

Diego’s wolf daemon is a not-so-secret softie. She prompts Diego to interact more with his family and sends longing glances towards Detective Patch and her daemon. She doesn’t get along with Luther’s daemon and always bristles when she’s around, though Luther’s daemon tends to ignore Diego’s and act like she’s above it all which just makes the issue even worse tbh. Diego’s daemon doesn’t shy away from her instincts and refers to the family as her pack and is very vocal about both not killing Grace (though later she sits and whines when Diego does it) and letting Vanya out (Diego spits vitriol about Vanya but his daemon is suspiciously silent on the subject).

Allison: a burmese python! I will freely admit that i chose this 90% because of the feather boa in the beginning dance scene because I want Allison to have her daemon constantly draped around her neck and on her body, but snakes do tend to be associated with manipulation as well in some stories even though I can’t see it looking at their cute little faces?? But I mean Allison’s whole gig is manipulation so it fits even though I’m only justifying it after the fact lmao. 

Allison’s daemon is very laid back and rarely speaks up. Allison often accuses him of being lazy because she tends to carry him everywhere and he’s constantly on the hunt for warm places to curl up in. He used to ride on the back of Luther’s daemon a lot when Allison got fed up of carrying him. Uses the fact that he doesn’t have eyelids to stare people down when they’re being irritating. Generally does not appreciate the negative press that comes with being a snake daemon and secretly him and Allison both wonder if him being a snake was a factor in her not getting custody of Claire. (Allison didn’t appreciate what he settled as and they fought about it, there’s still some tension between them on occasion because of it)

Klaus: a black cat! I almost gave him a raven because reasons but I ended up with a cat for pretty simple reasons: Klaus is pretty much a stray cat in human form tbh just look at him. Also because cats stare off into corners like they can see the dead and damned so I thought it was somewhat appropriate, and black cats are considered both lucky and unlucky depending on where you like (which lemme tell you as a black cat owner who moved from a lucky to unlucky area was a wild thing to find out). 

Klaus’s daemon is very sarcastic and a lot less forgiving than Klaus himself is. They hold a grudge to say the least. While most daemons tend not to speak to people who aren’t their own, Klaus’s daemon doesn’t give a single shit and will talk to anyone they damn well please. Doesn’t get along with Luther’s daemon because they constantly talk shit about Reggie and Reggie’s daemon, but gets along very well with Diego’s daemon and has ridden on her shoulder more than once. Shares Klaus’s power in that they can see the dead but ignores them even harder than Klaus because they’re secretly freaked out that ghosts don’t have daemons. Klaus and his daemon also hang out with Ben’s daemon, who for reasons unknown didn’t burst into dust upon Ben’s death but she generally stays out of sight.

Five: one part of me says hare because of the cryptic value and eyes that look like they could kill you and also jumping jokes and another part of me says hummingbird for plenty of good reasons but an even larger part of me says that I don’t have to choose because I can just symbolically make his daemon unsettled. She wasn’t settled before the apocalypse and then he kind of… never really grew up. Part of a daemon settling is growing up and knowing yourself but Five didn’t have a chance to do that, he was too focused on his goal. They both dislike the fact that she’s unsettled because they think it’s childish, but it’s also very handy because it means she’s adaptable as fuck. Maybe she pretends she’s settled as a hare or something while they work for the Commission idk and it’s a little reveal when he’s back home. Maybe they’re also separated like a witch’s daemon due to the Commission?? unclear

Five’s daemon tends to fade into the background if you’ll let her. She tends to be standoffish but is exceptionally observant. She very rarely speaks to anyone outside of Five, even among the siblings, though she’s not above bluntly calling them out if Five isn’t around and she deems it necessary. She likes Vanya best, though she was also fond of Ben. She tends to be the voice of reason for Five and probably takes most of Dolores’s lines in telling him drinking is bad for him or that his equations are wrong. There’s probably a dramatic scene where she’s revealed to be unsettled where she turns into a big fuckoff animal and fucks up the Handler or something idk but otherwise she’s pretty content to remain a hare and do a good impression of the rabbit from monty python if people fuck with her.

Ben: something smaller and easily hidden. My heart says rat because they’re so fucking good and smart so that’s what I’m going to run with, and also because they’re often viewed negatively and Ben has a power that he also views negatively rip. Also I’m gonna be real the idea of Klaus and Ben’s daemons being absolute bros as a cat and a rat also amuses me so there’s that and this is my au i do what i want. 

Ben’s daemon was withdrawn before his death and even more so after. No one knows why she didn’t turn to dust when Ben died, but she didn’t. None of the other siblings knew that she survived because she asked Klaus not to tell, worried that Reginald would experiment on her to try and figure out why she didn’t vanish. She spent most of their time before Klaus left hiding in his room, and after she hides in his clothes a lot and likes when he wears items with hoods (like Ben used to) because she likes to curl up in them. Like Five’s daemon, she doesn’t talk much. 

Vanya: a spotted owl! I wanted to give Vanya a winged daemon that can’t fly for most of the duration of the plot despite having wings because of general symbolism reasons regarding Reginald “clipping her wings” by suppressing her powers with medication and all that. Honestly I mostly picked a spotted owl on a whim because I like owls (I was a guardians of gahoole kid) and I think that the hints of white on a spotted owl would be a cool allusion to her powers and also there’s some sick imagery in her powers activating and her daemons colors reversing so that he’s primarily white soooo i do what i want is the answer

Like I said above, Vanya’s daemon is a bird daemon who… doesn’t fly. He mostly spends his time on a perch that Vanya bought for him in her apartment. He doesn’t actually spend a lot of time physically on Vanya outside of when they’re travelling somewhere, and she usually puts him down immediately when she arrives at her destination. He usually just walks about the house but like a chicken can do a sort of jump/flap combo to get up to surfaces so he’s alright for the most part. I want to say part of Leonard’s manipulations was that he also has a bird daemon and they try and teach Vanya’s daemon to fly as well as for her to access her powers.

and outside of the main kids (these aren’t nearly as well thought out and are liable to change probably - 

Reginald: a fox. Cunning and intelligent and adaptable, she’s regal and stone cold, never speaking directly to any of the children and she often acts as if they don’t exist or are so far beneath her they might as well not. Her coat is always pristine, her dark eyes are always watching, and her teeth are dazzling and sharp and threatening even though the kids see her far more rarely than they do their father. She’s a ruthless pragmatist and often served as an observer during their training, after which she would whisper in Reginald’s ear and oftentimes there was a new and inventive torture waiting for them. Sometimes the kids feared her more than they feared their father. She’s only ever shown anything even approaching affection to Luther’s daemon, and even that was just brushing herself past the other daemon and allowing a brief touch.

Hazel: a big grizzly bear. They often both complain about the lack of accommodations for large daemons when she has to squeeze her ass into their tiny motel rooms or in diner booths and restaurant tables in general. Tends to just stay in the hotel room and allow people to assume Hazel has a small daemon since they’re separated and her bulk is often cumbersome for missions. Has 100% charged in as the cavalry and fucked people up though don’t mistake her whining for her not being very dangerous.

Cha-Cha: my heart says a mountain lion and so that’s what i’m going with. Large and can do a lot of damage given the opportunity with those claws, pretty sneaky and damn good at his job. Is probably the one who scruffs Klaus’s daemon when they kidnap him from the house. He has a wicked sense of humor that Cha-Cha doesn’t always appreciate and always goes with for missions because he genuinely enjoys their work, doesn’t understand why Hazel’s daemon would rather stay behind.

Grace: yes I understand that Grace is a robot and no that’s not going to stop me from saying that Reginald gave her a mechanical clockwork butterfly daemon because I say so and because I think his daemon would have insisted that it’s far too creepy to look and see a human without a daemon and he’s trying to make her as realistic as possible, right? The butterfly is technically an extension of Grace, however Reginald never gave her daemon a voicebox because he deemed it unnecessary. He usually just sits on Grace’s shoulder slowly opening and closing his wings. A plot point is Grace finally naming her daemon for herself because Reginald never bothered with a name for him either.

The Handler: The Handler doesn’t have a daemon. Five asks her where her daemon is in the flashback scene where she recruits him and she laughs and tells him that that’s a rude question and never answers him. The daemon never shows up and other people and their daemons are noticeably unsettled by this. Five’s daemon genuinely is frightened by the Handler and tends to hide behind him, which the Handler comments upon with a saccharine smile. They never do figure out what happened to her daemon (though one of the office workers shares a rumor with Five that the Handler killed her own daemon for questioning the commission).

Patch: a terrier! My heart says border terrier so that’s what I’m going with. Dogged and unwilling to let go when she feels like she’s on the scent of something, she’s a good police officer even if she has torn loyalty to Diego as well. He’s a hardy little thing and he encourages her to bend the rules so much so that it used to be a running joke that her daemon might as well be Diego’s. Her daemon doesn’t bother with the hostilities and is always pleased to see Diego’s daemon. For the most part they just watch their idiot humans snipe at one another and are content to chill until Patch makes Diego leave. Their daemons always cheerfully say bye to each other and that they’ll see the other again soon even

Dave: my heart says also a dog. Probably a farm dog. Australian Cattle Dog, maybe? because my heart also says that Dave was probably raised as a good honest farm boy or at the VERY LEAST his grandparents had a farm he spent his summers on as a child. Very loyal. She absolutely adores Klaus and his daemon and Klaus’s daemon curled up with her constantly. Touching another person’s daemon is a social booboo but out there in Vietnam both daemons saved the other’s human at least once. Dave’s daemon pretends that she’s more sensible than him and often would complain at Klaus’s daemon that the sexual tension was genuinely killing her and if they kept gazing into one another’s eyes on the disco floor she was gonna barf. Klaus’s daemon would just roll their eyes because it’s not like they as daemons weren’t all touchy feely. Klaus’s daemon could be constantly seen grooming Dave’s with their little cat sandpaper tongue and Dave’s daemon constantly rested her head on Klaus’s to go to sleep sO. The scene where Dave dies is doubly sad because you see her turning into dust as Klaus’s daemon howls.

Agnes: almost forgot Agnes whoops. But I choose… a canary! Why? Because they’re bright and pretty and sing nicely and she would forever be explaining that yes, her daemon is a canary but it isn’t a domestic canary so that’s why he has brown on him and isn’t pure yellow. That and I think it would be sort of cute if Hazel’s attention was caught by pretty birdsong initially so a songbird it is. Agnes’s daemon, when her and Hazel are together, likes to snuggle down into Hazel’s daemon’s fur and make a small attempt to preen her even though she’s like a million times his size. He’s absolutely fearless and doesn’t hesitate at Hazel’s large daemon like a lot of small daemons do which endears him to the assassin duo. Like genuinely I picked canary on an absolute whim but that same goes for most of these and no one can stop me.

is that everyone?? i think that’s everyone

EDIT: I FORGOT LEONARD which goes to show how much i repress his existence

Leonard: a great skua. Am I basing this on the fact that I wanted his daemon to be a bird for plot reasons and the first mean bird I could think of was that one dude who wanted to eat baby Mumble in Happy Feet? maybe. But yeah a generally normal looking bird with the capacity for great violence there we go that’s my reasoning thank you and good night. His daemon is unsettling to literally everyone except Vanya probably tbh and Vanya calls Allison out on daemon stereotyping because Allison has a SNAKE she should be BETTER THAN THAT. But yeah that’s all I got for tonight thanks for reading lads.

#ask me #anonymous #not what u asked for anon but you made me think of a daemon au sO #daemon au #tua #the umbrella academy #far tua long #luther hargreeves #diego hargreeves #Allison Hargreeves #klaus hargreeves #five hargreeves #number five #ben hargreeves #vanya hargreeves #reginald hargreeves #Grace Hargreeves #hazel #tua hazel #cha-cha #tua cha-cha #the handler #tua dave #dave katz #tua agnes #agnes rofa #eudora patch #detective patch #i think that's everyone #this was really self indulgent y'all

[in-tua-deep]

oof five leaving behind his daemon would be so painful because he comes back and she's still not settled and that persistent ache in his chest from having her be far from him eases but he also has no idea how to react to her and part of him wants to insist he doesn't need her (as he does with all the things he's forced himself to get used to lacking)

i can’t believe i have an au of an au lmao this is how far i have fallen 

Honestly Five not taking Pancha with him to the future would be HEARTBREAKING because you know she’d hide it, she wouldn’t want to let Reginald know she was still around so she might actually run away,, i don’t remember if daemons need to eat or anything because they’re made of dust but she’s unsettled - she could go off and live in the woods as a bird or a squirrel or a hare or a bee or a butterfly or anything. She’s a daemon set loose without a human to keep her to anything

But then again, she’s also Five’s soul, and at the end of the day Five loves his family enough to spend his entire life trying to make sure that before anything else, his family survives. He doesn’t save the world for the world’s sake, he does it for his family. He could have stayed with the Commission. Or he could have jumped wildly back in time with far looser equations if he didn’t care where he ended up so long as it wasn’t the apocalypse. 

In this au he’s also trying to get back to Pancha but the point remains

So Pancha probably doesn’t just fuck off. Not entirely. She’s unsettled. She can turn into an ant or a mouse or a dozen other small creatures to sneak around the house under everyone’s noses - and she watches

I want to say she goes to Ben, because Ben has some built in protections and also because in the dream she went to Ben and I can’t discount my subconscious that would be rude. But legit though, she might not want to put any more problems on Vanya or she might just believe Vanya can’t help her because Vanya is ordinary (Reginald’s dismissal of her was not just a surface level problem), but she knows that Ben is quiet and that he can keep a secret and most importantly, he can protect her if discovered. Ben has a very violent and uncontrollable power, Reginald wouldn’t cross him lightly

except Ben dies

but Tamaya remains, just like Pancha does, but Tamaya is settled she doesn’t have the same safety that Pancha does, can’t turn into a gnat in the blink of an eye - easily overlooked, so Pancha sought out Ben for company but Tamaya needs someone to hide her

and Tamaya chooses Klaus, and Pancha follows, and wow Klaus how come ur mom lets you have THREE daemons

and Klaus would be shocked because daemons are supposed to die when their humans do, but these two didn’t. (Pancha insists that Five is alive, he’s just lost to her. Klaus and Rowan and Tamaya probably don’t really believe her, but she doesn’t care because she knows, in her dust, that Five will come back)

and he does

Pancha grows used to life with Klaus and Rowan and Tamaya, she crawls into the mausoleums as a spider under Reginald’s nose and keeps her brother company, slides through cracks as an ant and curls comfort around Rowan. They leave and Klaus is on the streets and Pancha is canny and capable of spatial jumps and she’s willing to steal in the name of her family she lets Klaus lean on her strength

and they go to the funeral, all five of them. Klaus and Rowan and Tamaya and Ben and Pancha, though the others only know about two of them and Pancha curls up with Tamaya in the form of another rat in Klaus’s hoodie as Ben follows only seen to two of their number

and the world splits apart in the courtyard, and there’s a figure falling though, and Pancha is clawing her way out of Klaus’s pocket and shifting and leaping forward because that’s her boy. And Five is a fucking mess because it’s one thing putting on a brave face seeing your dead siblings alive again when he’s had forty some years to process that, but Pancha is the other half of his soul and that’s a wound that can’t heal

and Pancha is chewing him out and yelling at him to never ever do that again or leave her behind and he’s an idiot and Five is clinging to her just as much as she is to him and they’re both crying because for the first time in so many years they are whole and she knows their collective soul is so much older than their bodies but she doesn’t care and Five doesn’t even care that he’s thirteen again because how could he care when it feels the most right he’s ever been??

and the others are standing there, shocked, and no one exactly didn’t notice that Pancha hadn’t fallen from the portal and that she’d been on Klaus’s person but that’s put aside as Pancha in the form of a tiger grabs onto Five’s skinny wrist and yanks him to go into the house because she can feel the gnawing hunger in his gut and the gentle pain of almost-at-limits-but-not-quite and she raided the kitchen with the squad earlier so she knows that there’s peanut butter and marshmallows and bread and Five knows exactly what to do

and in this universe, Pancha has a pack. A squad. She’s spent the last seventeen years as Klaus-Rowan-Tamaya-Pancha-Ben and she’s not about to let her dumbass person go off on his own without her and she’s just as much not about to ditch the people who supported her

and Five, after that first incredible relief and rush and wonder, tries to push her away

(Pancha learns why later, when she’s staring at the Handler and feeling that rush of wrong wrong wrong because there is no daemon at the Handler’s side. Pancha stays small, stays as an ant sticking against Five’s skin until the right moment when she bursts forward and no one expects it because the commission doesn’t know everything, they thought she died in their separation because they didn’t start watching Five until after the jump, when they were so far apart. Five was a temporal assassin infamous for his lack of daemon just like the Handler was infamous in the organization for her own lack. So no one expected Pancha bursting from her boy’s sleeve and shifting in a flurry of teeth and claws to thoroughly destroy any who would dare try and get between her and saving her family)

but like,, Pancha isn’t about to let the other half of her walk away so easily not even if she has to turn into something big and sit on him and she can jump as well and can always feel where he is and so she’s not exactly going to let him get away with anything

so Klaus and Ben and Rowan and Tamaya get roped into pretty much all their plans because Pancha will stand for nothing less and Five is willing to sacrifice a lot to save his family but he’s not quite willing to sacrifice his soul. Not after just getting her back.

So it changes things, because the most important part about their shared power and ability to go far from one another is this: if one tugs, the other can answer. They can jump to one another’s sides in moment of need. So when Griddy’s is being shot up and Pancha and Five already argued about going off alone, Pancha pops up to smash some idiots with her boy. When the manor is being shot up and Klaus is kidnapped, Pancha pulls hard enough that Five is practically yanked through the portal instead of jumping himself. Maybe the rest of the family doesn’t notice Klaus’s disappearance, but Pancha does

and as she yells at Five, there’s no point in stopping the apocalypse if their siblings die first and Five remembers finding bodies, bodies and dust and he didn’t even see Rowan’s body because Rowan was dust and at least he had something to mourn for Klaus and fuck - Pancha’s always been able to get him to do exactly what she wants so they go and rescue Klaus

(sorry Dave, Klaus probably doesn’t meet him - but Eudora Patch gets to live because Five and Pancha yank her out of the way and save her life as well as rescuing Klaus and so you know what hell yes Patch and her terrier daemon get to follow Klaus and chew out Diego because what the fuCK diego and joins their saving-the-world-squad because I love her and would die for her)

also Tamaya would come in super handy honestly because if they’re looking at Klaus-and-Rowan and Five-and-Tamaya then no one is looking for Pancha because who the fuck expects another random daemon to exist everyone knows that people don’t have two daemons. They’ll look at Tamaya balancing on Five’s shoulder (all according to plan) and they won’t look any closer because why would they?? Ben and Pancha team up to slide invisibly wherever they need to get because Pancha abuses her unsettled ability to adapt and change eyyyy

at some point Klaus is probably going to awkwardly address the fact that Pancha is unsettled and Five is going to brush it off

but honestly like all this espionage and the new tight knit bond between Klaus-Ben-Five-Rowan-Tamaya-Pancha doesn’t help the underlying issue: Leonard and Vanya and powers that should have never been hidden

i don’t know how this au would end but i would hope they manage to stop the apocalypse bc they would try so hard to do so :(

I just want all these dumbasses to be HAPPY is that too much to ask

#ask me #dgalerab #daemon au #daemon au au #? #tua au #tua #the umbrella academy #five hargreeves #number five #pancha #klaus hargreeves #rowan #ben hargreeves #tamaya #i can't believe i have an au of an au #wild