2:15

They both knew what Five had to do and Violet wasn't keen on letting him go alone - if he got hurt she could heal him, not that she didn' trust his ability to look after himself, she just worried. That and everytime he left her alone some small part of her feared he would never come back.

He understood the look she was giving him and shook his head deploringly. "Absutely not."

She glared.

"No. You're not coming with me."

She huffed and crossed her arms over her chest.

He stared at her and mirrored her actions. "You're staying at Elliot's. It won't take me long anyways."

"Five," she murmured with a frown, the words lodging in her throat. She swallowed uncomfortably.

She wasn't letting him do this alone. She wasn't letting him suffer alone. She was going with him whether he liked it or not.

"You said it yourself, you shouldn't have left me alone-"

"-don't." His eyes darkened slightly, dismay crossing his face as he closed eyes, shaking his head at her slowly. His eyebrows knitted together. "Don't do that..." he said quietly.

The girl stared sternly at him, unwavering now. The adrenaline was still in her body, so maybe she had that to blame for her stubbornness but she cared too much about the boy in front of her to let him go alone.

He wasn't alone anymore and he needed to know that.

Five sighed heavily, looking at her and speaking with surprising vulnerability. He looked away for a moment, heart heavy.

She just didn't understand.

He needed her to understand.

"I don't want you to see me kill anyone," he admitted, barely audible, and the girl's expression softened considerably. "I don't want you to see any of it. You shouldn't have to."

Violet's heart hurt and she looked down at the floor, closing the space between them so she could gently take one of his hands in her own. She held on tightly and he did the same.

"You shouldn't have to do it..." She whispered back shakily, struggling to get her words out, holding his hand even tighter as her frustration rose. She closed her eyes. "-in the first place!"

How right she was, but how cruel the world they were in was too. Neither would get what they wanted nor what they truly deserved simply because they existed as they did.

"I don't want..." Five tried, trailing off and looking away, jaw tensing.

He didn't want her to think he was the terrible person that he feared he already was.

He wanted Violet to think of him as she already did and didn't know what he'd do if that changed. He didn't think he could cope if she saw him in any other way than the rose tinted lenses she already did.

She deserved more. Better. So much better. So much more than what he could offer.

If he said this aloud she would disagree.

And still, he might not believe her words.

He sighed and tugged her a step closer by their linked hands, making her glance up at him anxiously. "Look," he started finally. "I'm not letting you go with me and that's final."

She tried to pull her hand from his in protest, annoyed, but he didn't let her.

"Listen to me!" He practically pleaded, tilting his head so she would meet his eyes. She did with a squared jaw. He needed her to listen. "The Handler is the reason I have to do this and I don't want you anywhere close to her if I can help it. You're not coming with me. I'm not letting her get to you, I'm not risking you, and I'm not taking no for an answer."

His tone was stone on stone as he tried to get her to see where he was coming from, and finally, she glanced away from him and narrowed her eyes at the floor in thought.

When she gave the slightest dip of the chin after a long, heavy silence that was painful for Five considering the anticipation of her response, a weight was lifted from his chest.

His eyes lightened a fraction and he squeezed her hand. She glimpsed up through a curtain of her hair covering her face, still looking unhappy and in deep consideration.

"Thank you."

Violet nodded and Five blinked them back to Elliots.

And the quiet girl felt awful, truly, for what she was about to do.

She felt awful for what Five was going to do in an attempt to save them all and his family. She felt awful for a lot of things.

But mostly she felt guilty because the fingers on her other hand had been crossed the entire time.

•○•○•

Five assumed he was alone when he met with the Handler at a far off motel across town.

But Violet had been smart enough to cloak herself the second he left and followed him, guilt eating her up the entire time for lying.

She waited outside the room, steps silent the entire time, breathing so shallow as to not make a sound.

He left with a slip of paper in hand and just before he used the single use briefcase the woman had given him, she slowly reached for the opposite side of it and put her hand on it.

They both ended up in nineteen eighty two, when only one was supposed to, and she had been so deadly silent that he didn't know.

The briefcase he carried with him, heading straight for the lodge in front of them. No one batted an eye at his appearance and, of course, no one noticed Violet using her invisibility. He tucked the thing beneath a decorated tablecloth covered table near the exit.

She followed him at a great distance just in case he heard something or she got too close. He would be so angry if he found out and the anxiety was gnawing away at her resolve as she chewed on her fingernails, watching him ask a curly haired, chipper lady for some change.

Violet rationalised in her head as she followed, ducking around corners and peering past people, swiftly turning and moving through to avoid them touching her.

He had said earlier he couldn't risk her.

As though she could risk him so willingly?

It was hypocritical. It wasn't fair.

Five had no idea if this was a trap or not - if he got injured, if he was hurt and somehow couldn't get back to them, no one would know.

No one except for her, who would realise that he hadn't come back like he promised to, again.

And Violet couldn't do that again.

She could not risk Five, because he was the only good thing in her life - he was all she had - and she was in control now. She wasn't weak, she wasn't as meek as she used to be, as much of a pushover.

She was making this decision on her own, knowing the risks, and willing to anyway.

Violet watched as attempted to pay for a fudge nutter from a vending machine when it got stuck. He lost his temper, mind too consumed with the weight of what he was about to do, and kicked through the pane of glass in the front of the machine in a startling rage. It shattered inwards and the girl flinched, clutching the edge of the wall she was hidden behind.

He ran a hand through his hair and she caught herself staring. He glanced around, spotting an emergency axe on the wall and went to pull it down, staring down at it in his hands and testing the weight.

Violet cautiously approached, decades of sneaking around and being a ghost in practice coming into use as she kept herself  close to the edges of the walls, eyeing the squaring of his jaw as he rationalised what he was about to do.

The double doors ahead of them were closed and he approached, pushing the door open and heading inside, clutching the axe.

Violet glimpsed his back for a second just before the doors swung closed again.

Her heart rate picked up as she chewed on her nails, settling herself off away in the corner as crashes and faint cries travelled through the doors, making her grimace.

After just a few minutes of her fighting the urge to cover her ears, fidgeting and bouncing on her heels to stop herself from getting closer to satisfy her curiosity. Morbid, as it was.

The violent noises faded into nothing after a few minutes and she couldn't help it. She had expected Five to leave the room by now but the gnawing paranoia in her gut made her approach the door, fingertips just barely brushing the doors edge so she could open it just a centimeter at a painfully slow pace, holding her breath.

Blood covered the floors, the walls, red staining the fancy rug and there was a body just feet from where she peered through, her face slashed through to the bone and one of her arms missing. A knocked over rotary phone was barely within reach of her cold dead fingers. (The ones she still had.)

She let out a shaky breath, stomach churning. She had seen worse, she had caused worse, but it didn't seem real knowing who had caused it. The room was dead quiet within minutes. She began to realise how much she had underestimated Five's ruthlessness and wondered with a twinge of uncertainty if she really knew him at all anymore - the commission had turned him into something entirely mechanical.

The slither of carnage she could see burned into her mind and for some reason, she struggled to tear her eyes away from it all.

She'd never seen so much blood caused by one person.

Her fingers grasped the edge of the door and she swallowed, skin beginning to crawl - it was different seeing violent wounds on her own body, it was something she could handle and was used to.

Violet went to back away and turned, but a bright blue flash right in front of her face blinded her in a shock.

In a split second it happened. She knew she'd made a terrible mistake.

She saw the axe swinging towards her and realised too late that her invisibly had accidentally dropped. On instinct her arm shot up in defence and the nerves in her palm screamed. Violet's back hit the floor, a little whimper of pain escaping when she fearfully raised her eyes to meet his bloodthirsty ones.

When he finally let his eyes focus, landing properly from his spacial jump as he had acted so quickly, so viciously in the space of a single second - only thing on his mind being that he had to kill the members of the board and he had checked before that no civilians were near - he shouldn't have had to worry about accidentally swinging at anyone else - his expression switched from a vicious determination to absolute shock as his gaze focussed on the girl he was standing over.

"Violet?" Her name fell numbly from his lips, grip on the axe loosening.

It clattered to the floor and the girl flinched, tears lining her eyes as she stared at the deep gash in her trembling palm, turning it to face her with mild horror. The blood stained her bare arm, trailing down her skin and dropping quickly onto the floor.

The white of her bones peeked through the gory mess. The wound slashed right from between her index and middle finger all the way down to her wrist.

Five Hargreeves met her pained eyes, his expression switching quickly from abject horror to a furious glare.

She couldn't help but flinch when he blinked then came back rapidly, hand latching around her upper arm as they were pulled through space and time.

She hadn't even seen the briefcase he'd retrieved before they landed in Elliot's apartment and she fell back again, slipping from his grip, the bloodloss and sudden movement getting to her head. Her vision swam as Diego and Luther swore in alarm, racing into the kitchen where they'd landed.

She couldn't think properly.

Her mind was slow, trying to catch up to what had happened.

"What the hell happened to you two?" Luther exclaimed, eyeing the blood covering the two. Mostly Five.

"I could have fucking killed you."

They all froze at the quiet viciousness in Five's voice, most of all Violet who couldn't help the fear crawling up her spine and working its way into her heart as she stared up at the boys dark expression, clenched jaw, tense shoulders and clenched fists.

She shrank back, clutching her hand tightly.

"Hey!" Diego called out, eyes darting between the two, not liking his tone.

Violet couldn't talk, still too in shock.

"I could have killed you!"

An apology died on her lips as he snatched her up by the upper arms and pulled her to a stand roughly, furious face just inches from hers. Her heart rate spiked, leaping into her throat, her eyes lining with tears as she tried and failed to pull away.

He towered over her and got close enough to where she felt his hot breath on her cheek. She'd never seen him so angry. She ducked her head down, hair falling in her face.

"I told you to stay. Why didn't you listen?!" He seethed, shaking her slightly, eyes wide with rage and burning shame.

Her skin was crawling as she stared wide eyed, tearful up at Five.

"Five, cut it out-" Diego shouted.

"Are you fucking stupid?!" He all but screamed in her face, grip bruising her arms now.

A lump formed in her throat, words dying on her lips, and she opened her mouth to spout out an apology again but she couldn't breathe.

No one could stop him, the words tumbling from his mouth, his rage filling the entire room to where Diego and Luther watched in shock.

Not once would they have ever dreamt to see Five Hargreeves raise his voice at Violet. Never.

Five continued his tirade. "What the fuck is wrong with you that you'd think sneaking along was a good idea? I mean did you even think?"

The girl trembling before him could do nothing but stare fearfully up at him, her breaths coming out in short, quiet gasps, her chest burning with pain. It was like someone had stabbed right through her heart.

She wanted to get him off of her.

She wanted him to get away.

She had made a mistake, but he had never shouted at her before, never put his hands on her before like this - she could feel her skin beginning to bruise and could do nothing simply because her body was paralysed with terror at the one person she never thought she could be afraid of.

"I-" she couldnt get the words out. His eyes furiously searched her own.

"I almost fucking killed you and you cant even say anything!" He shouted, jostling her slightly and she couldn't help the whimper that left her. Her lip trembles.

How dare he? How dare he use her muteness against her?

"I-- I didnt--" her voice was so meek, so quiet, so breathless. She closed her eyes, a tear slipping down her cheek. "Let--- let--"

"I mean, are you stupid?!"

She wanted him to stop. It felt like her chest was being ripped open. She didn't care about her bleeding hand.

Violet wanted for the first time in her life to get his hands off of her.

"Five, alright!" Diego yelled over him. He went to pull Five away but the boy turned on him, releasing one of Violet's arms to point at him scathingly.

"Stay out of this." He threatened lowly.

Diego hesitated.

"What the hell is going on?" Luther stared straight at the blood covered Five. "Why is she bleeding?"

The brothers didn't care about Five covered in blood. They did, however, care about Violets injury.

Violet couldn't hear anything but the static in her head and felt nothing but pain and her skin screaming at her.

With only one hand wrapped around her upper arm now, she stumbled back away from him but when his head turned to face her, eyes dark, and the grip tightened, she couldn't help it.

She slapped him round the face with her good hand.

The sound of the hit silenced the room and he dropped her arm.

Violet stumbled back, feeling as though her lungs were filling with fluid again, her chest burning, the pain swallowing her whole. She backed away until her back hit the wall and all of the noises rushed away from her mind. She slid down and brought her knees to her chest, cradling her bloody hand against her chest, tears streaming down her face. Her body cloaked until she appeared transparent,  a ghostly apparition curled up so small and still wishing to disappear.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Diego yelled, moving so that he stood between him and the catatonic girl. Luther moved to do the same.

Violet tried to control her breathing, tried to take a deep breath but it sent pangs of pain through her chest everytime. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she clutched her bleeding hand until the blood began to stop pouring out.

Still shaking, unable to think clearly, her body still managed to heal itself and the wound disappeared, fading into nothing but a harsh, thick scar going down her palm. All that was left on her was the blood, sticky on her cold skin.

"You have no idea what-"

"-and I dont give a damn!" Diego snapped back. He pointed down at the girl. "Look at her! Look what you're doing!"

The boy did, eyes falling on her, and the anger began to dissipate.

She could not look at him.

He shook his head, swallowing thickly. "I didn't..."

Luther frowned deeply in concern. "Wait, did you do that?" He was talking about her hand that, despite being healed, she still clutched close to her chest as the burning nerves still screamed inside her body, unable to heal quite as quickly in her state. "Did you hurt Violet?"

Five couldn't then tear his eyes away from her. She looked so terrified, so distraught. He had never seen her so...

And he had been the one to cause it.

"You did this?" Diego emphasised, fists clenching at his side as he narrowed his eyes at the boy.

He ran a hand through his hair, unable to think. "It was an accident. I didnt know she was there. She-"

The words died on his tongue. He knew he was digging himself a deeper hole to bury himself in. And as he processed what he was saying he realised how much of a mistake he had made.

"An accident?!" Luther exclaimed.

"Five, look at her!" Diego demanded, stepping slightly to the side.

The boy did. And the guilt was so pressing he felt the urge to scream.

The world was about to end for the second time, he had just murdered a room full of people to clutch any chance they might have of getting back, and in doing so he had simultaniously severed the link to the only thing he truly cared about that was worth saving, worth doing it all for.

"I-"

The roles had been reversed again and now he couldn't speak. Nothing he could say could defend himself, could help them see it from his point of view. Nothing he said now, could even convince himself that what he had done was justified - it wasnt, it was a mistake, and he had fucked up.

And he had blamed it all on her.

Time was ticking, the skin on his cheek stung, he was covered in blood and the adrenaline was wearing off.

Suddenly, with Diego and Luther judging him so viciously, glaring at him like he was this awful person they didn't even know - and he was. He knew he was - he felt as though he couldn't breathe.

And with an apology dying at the lump in his throat, he silently begged Violet to raise her tearful eyes from the floor, but she didn't.

And so he did what any coward would do - he left to go get their briefcase.

Violet tore her gaze from the floor as he left in a blink, her heart sinking.

With barely coherent thoughts, she disappeared too before Diego and Luther could prise any response out of her.

She guessed they were both cowards.