umbrellajackassery | 01: i spend too much time ghosting [ota]

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01: i spend too much time ghosting [ota]

In the name of avoiding everyone and everything until he had sorted out the chaos in his own head, Ben had gone into hiding.

He hadn't left or gone anywhere else, he could still feel that tether drawing him back here, but that was where it got messy. Ben had several truths in his world. Even death didn't stop the Horror. Being dead sucked. He knew where Klaus was.

He was sixteen when he died, just shy of seventeen. And ever since then, nearly half of his existence, he always knew where Klaus was. It was always just a thought and he was right near him, usually in the middle of whatever chaos Klaus had caused.

But there wasn't a Klaus.

He was sure he'd seen at least three by now. One of them was definitely not the Klaus he thought of as 'his', because he had a Ben with him, a living, smiling Ben. And he was fairly sure he'd seen another version of himself, silent and invisible and lurking in a corridor outside a door.

But he wasn't sure which one was his and it was overwhelming and frightening, in a way that the world hadn't been for him for a long time. Which was why he had decided to go to the place he hated most and he knew the others would mostly avoid.

He went to Sir's office and sat down in a corner on an antique chair that they never would have been allowed to touch. He sat and rubbed his stomach where the Horror roiled, unsettled by his own discomfort.

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For a moment, Ben doesn't register what has happened.

Being dead doesn't really feel like anything. He had memories of hot, cold, sharp, soft, but they're just memories, concepts that slip a little further away every day. So when his hands stop moving, there's this moment where he just assumes he's stopped moving on his own.

And then he realises he feels... warmth.

The surge of emotions is almost painful, not the muted emotions of being dead but the actual strong, kick in the gut realisation that in this moment he's real. His hands clench reflexively to grab Klaus', eyes flying open to find Klaus already looking.

He doesn't manage a noise. He just holds and stares.

Klaus' eyes connect with Ben's the moment they open, and he only shifts his hands enough to slide his fingers between his brother's and squeeze back. Then, slowly, slowly, a smile blooms across his face, and he laughs. Lifts his hands along with Ben's and watches as Ben's body reacts to his, as Ben's arms follow his hands, and there's weight and substance and it's great. It's so great.

"Whoa, there you are."

Klaus is lifting his hands.

Ben might tremble, he's not sure, but he's feeling a lot of something or a lot of a lot of somethings, not necessarily all the same something.

And it only takes that momentary flush of emotions for one of the Horrors to slip out and grab Klaus and haul him bodily forwards to crush them together in a tight hug.

He almost loses it when the tentacle flies out of Ben's abdomen and curls around him, abrupt and startling when he'd been so focused on their hands. But he doesn't lose it, and he only allows himself to be proud for a second before focusing on Ben again.

'Emotional and focused on someone else.'

Laughing, he lets go of Ben's hands and wraps his arms around his brother's shoulders, pulling him in close, flattening a hand against his back. Ben is solid and substantial and there's an actual impact sound when he pats his back.

"Oh man. Man! It's been way too long."

Klaus doesn't even notice he's crying until his voice cracks halfway through the second 'man.'

Klaus thuds into him and nearly knocks them both off their feet, but he catches his balance by throwing himself forward into Klaus and holding on like it's a life line.

Klaus is all angles and points and really not that different than the last time Ben hugged him because he was all angle and points then. He grasps at Klaus' back and it feels a tiny bit desperate, but it's real and when he ducks his head, he can feel the heat of Klaus' neck where he's buried his face in against him.

"You're so warm," he barely whispers.

Ben isn't warm, but Klaus couldn't care less. Ben's face is pressed into his neck, cool and comforting and he can feel Ben's fingers digging into his back, and suddenly he's past crying. He's pressing his face into Ben's shoulder, and his narrow shoulders shake for a moment, and he sobs a little, inhaling against Ben's shoulder.

Half-laughing and half-crying, he lifts his head, eyes red and bright, cheeks wet with tears.

"You smell good."

Ben doesn't lift his head when he laughs, just smothers the noise on Klaus' neck and hugs him impossibly tighter. He can feel the Horror wriggling excitedly, the one tentacle out squeezing tighter and another trying to squeeze out between them to join in.

He's feeling too many good things to worry or freak out about them.

"You feel thin." Always too thin, but that's Klaus.

When Ben doesn't lift his head, Klaus lets his own drop down again, his hands closing into handfuls of Ben's sweater, squeezing him close and tight, and the Horror doesn't bother him as it squeezes. Klaus could probably die happy right now (tries to ignore the fact that on any given day he'd be relieved to die) just because of this.

"Yeah well. Maybe that's gonna change because I'm never getting high again, ever. So no more dumpster diving. Maybe we can go see the ocean."

With a couple of firm pushes, another tentacle wriggles between them and curls up around Klaus, the spade like tip resting against the back of Klaus' head, cradling him.

"Pretty sure you don't need to be high to go dumpster diving," Ben whispers. "We should go to the ocean. Find tide pools." Inevitably watch Klaus get pinched by a crab, or step on a sea urchin. "Don't let go."

"I know, I just mean...money."

A laugh, light and breathless and a little disbelieving as the second tentacle slides free of Ben's body and curls around him. It's then that he feels the exhaustion in the corners of his mind, feels the tight sort of ache in him as he struggles to hold onto the string of energy between them.

"I don't wanna, Ben, but I don't know how much longer I can hold on..."

He can feel the sweat beading on his brow, but he keeps holding, squeezing tight.

Ben can feel Klaus trembling with the strain and if there's one thing Ben wants more than to be real again, it's to never be someone who adds to the stress of Klaus' life.

"It's okay," he promises. "You can relax, just... don't let go until I do? Please?" It's easier if he lets go first, if it's the power dissipating rather than Klaus letting go of their hug.

"No."

Instead of doing what Ben asks, Klaus feels that abrupt sinking feeling, the failure feeling, and he clings harder. Slides in closer and parts his feet so they can get as close as humanly possible. He holds onto it until there's sweat running down his face, his eyes squeezed shut with tension.

"No, it's not okay, Ben. It's not okay. No. No no no..."

He can feel it slipping, can feel it sliding through his fingers like water.

"Shh." Ben lifts his head and wipes the tears off Klaus' cheek like he used to when they were little. "I'm not going anywhere, okay? I'm going to be right here. I stick around so much that you get sick of me being around."

Maybe, if Ben clings more, he could hold on, but Klaus is going to make himself throw up from the strain soon. So instead, he lets go of the power, unspooling it to let it form slack between them and he can feel his form collapse again and with it goes the sharp awareness of emotion, muting back to something quieter.

"It's okay, Klaus. I let go, not you."

"No no no no...no no..."

He's mumbling it, over and over again, even as Ben looks at him and wipes at his face, cool fingers brushing the tears away. It's stupid, Ben isn't going anywhere, but it's been so damn long since he's had a hug like this, something more than Diego giving him a quick squeeze after Ben saved his life.

"No no, Ben...come on, no no no..."

And then Ben dissipates in his arms, Klaus feels himself falling forward through his brother, and he stumbles, flails his arms out, trips over his own feet and then catches his balance before sinking to his knees and rubbing at his face, exhausted and abruptly, painfully lonely.

Ben drops to his knees next to Klaus, the Horror retreating again with whipcord speed and he lets his hand hover above Klaus' hunched back. "Hey, no, Klaus, you did it. You did it. You pulled me through, you held me here, I got to hug you for the first time in thirteen years. You did amazing, so amazing."

Frail, fragile Klaus, who spent so much time being told how pointless and useless he was that he internalised it completely and Ben wants him to see how big this is.

"You gave me that. You did that. And you've done it once, we'll work on it more."

It isn't as bad as when Ben had died the first time. That had been the worst, Klaus can still remember how blitzed he'd gotten afterward, just completely lost, afraid that Ben would show up to him the way he is now. Except, it hadn't been Ben he was afraid of, it had been seeing Ben the way the others were, still afflicted with the injuries that killed them, in pain, angry, screaming.

He wants to get high now. Wants to get totally blitzed because it feels bad, worse than he'd thought it would, and maybe it's because losing Dave is still fresh, because that grief is still bubbling up in him that he's overreacting to the end of a hug (but he hasn't hugged Ben in 13 years) and realizing that he hasn't hugged someone like that since Dave. It feels like everything is ending.

But he chokes off the tears, and looks up at Ben, forces a wan smile and rubs at his face with a trembling hand.

"Yeah...okay, we can...we can keep working on it."

A hard swallow, and he laughs, pulls a cigarette out of his pocket and tucks it in his mouth, lights it up, the one vice he can still have without shutting Ben out. His hand is shaking hard enough after the first few draws that the ash falls off and lands in a powdery cylinder on his thigh and he brushes it away absently.

"Sorry. I'm fine. I'm fine, totally fine."

HIgh or not, Ben has nearly always been able to get through, probably because of the fact that Ben haunts Klaus out of their mutual need for each other, for being the brothers who understood being terrified of their powers.

Ben wants nothing more than to crawl into Klaus' lap, like he was a little kid again, when he could fit easily and just hug Klaus until they both calmed. But he can't and they're not, so he comes as close as he dares without actually touching and he focuses on the feeling of Klaus' ability, on how it feels in him, almost like his own power, reaching across a divide of worlds and he lays his hand on Klaus' knee.

It's not stable. There's a halo of blue light, but there is, also, a little resistance. "I'm not going anywhere, Klaus."

A long drag, and he holds the acrid smoke in his lungs for a moment before exhaling, eyes half-closed while he tries to find some semblance of peace or balance or whatever. Tries to stop being so in his own head because they're both hurting right now and that kind of thing is easier shared.

He glances up when he can see Ben moving out of the corner of his eye, huddling up close to him, and Klaus can tell Ben's a little bit in his own head too. He makes a wan smile, rubs at his eyes.

But then he feels it. The slight cool pressure against his knee, and his head jerks up, he meets Ben's eyes.

"I know man, I know. You've always been there..."

Tentatively, he lowers his hand, rests it over where Ben's is on his knee. And he can feel it, just a little, like Ben's hand has substance, and he holds his breath. Doesn't mention it, just in case he's jinxing it.

"I couldn't leave you on your own. Look at the trouble you get into even with me here." He focuses his concentration more, on just the one hand, on the feeling of just a single appendage becoming real and controlled and if he thinks of it, using Klaus' power to be real (with Klaus, anyway) isn't so different from using his own power.

He becomes a little more real to his own reckoning. He can carry the strain, give Klaus a break. And squeezes his hand on Klaus's knee, the flesh refusing to let him phase.

Klaus' green eyes lift as Ben says he couldn't leave him on his own, that he gets into trouble even with Ben there. For a moment, he puffs on his cigarette and looks at Ben and remembers a thousand times Ben has kept him from ODing or warned him about some danger he was oblivious to or talked him out of doing something stupid.

Licking his lips, he looks down at where Ben's hand sits on his knee and squeezes. He's not doing it, Ben is, and it feels like a breakthrough. He doesn't know how to process it.

"I guess you could call it getting into trouble, huh...I have heard it called 'pissing my life away.' No idea who might've said that."

He manages to crack a little grin.

"No idea," Ben echoes smartly. They're ever the double act, since childhood. "Must've been someone who was through with your bullshit at the time."

Just like the Horror. Concentrate, a mix of focus and feeling, intent and emotion. He doesn't loosen his grips, instead he feels the press of fingerbones into too little muscle.

"Mmmm, so it could've been anyone."

Another puff from his cigarette, and he closes his eyes, shivering a little. He's exhausted and strung out and his emotions are all over the place. The cigarette is half-gone, and he can feel Ben's hand under his. He squeezes it.

"I need to...get back on the whole training thing, don't I?"

"You should try and sleep," Ben murmurs. "For a while. I'll stay with you. We can practice more when you wake up." Klaus wanted to train and Ben knows he needs to get himself healthy enough to think about doing that. Needs actual sleep and some regular meals.

"Sleep."

He murmurs it, pushes his hand through his hair, and sighs before getting up and climbing into the bed. He's already barefoot, and he's done worse than sleeping in his leather pants, so he just squirms under the blankets. And it's stupid, because he knows Ben wouldn't leave and doesn't need to sleep, but he still asks, his voice soft like a little kid's-

"Promise you'll stay?"

Ben follows Klaus, hovering uncertainly and then deciding.

Instead of promising, he climbs on the bed (which he knows he can't do, but that's how he interacts with furniture unless he focuses on ignoring it) and lays down on his side, back to the door and facing Klaus.

He doesn't sleep. "I'll stay here, okay? I'll keep them away from you. You can sleep."

Them could be many things. The other brothers. The duplicates. The ghosts. Whatever it is, he means it.

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01: i spend too much time ghosting [ota]

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