Young!Klaus Shenanigans

[ghostphone]

Come one, come all. Get your teen!Klaus shenanigans here. Options in the comments, or start your own adventure! Multi-person threads are great (no post order, just slide in and out at will plz), threadjacking encouraged! Specify in your top-reply to any of mine if you DON'T want people to threadjack though (because sometimes one-to-ones are necessary TOO!)

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[obediences]

Witnessing this bare pain, stripped down to the bone, results in a sympathetic ache in Luther's chest, the panic of I don't know what to do and I don't know how to fix this. Because they can't quit the Academy. It was never something they signed up for, but they'd been flung into it since birth anyway, with no chance to opt out. It was their job. It was their purpose in life. It was what they did.

And Sir Reginald was the reigning king of cruel, cutting comments that chased them back into the saddle, and Luther might have been learning those lessons at their father's elbow, but he still can't put those sorts of words in his own mouth. Doesn't know how to do it. So he sits down on his brother's bed instead (all rumpled tangled sheets, unlike Luther's, which is made tight and pristine until you could bounce a coin off it). Draws an arm around Klaus' narrow shoulders, his bowed head and whole body turtling in on itself.

"You're not a fuck-up or a failure, Klaus," he says, because he can't think of anything else to say, and the rest of the truth is too miserable to name. (It'll never be over.) "You're just... still learning. Remember how Diego almost drowned when he was first learning his powers? It's a process."

[ghostphone]

He doesn't fight it at all when Luther slides an arm around him, if anything he only leans into his brother's side further for all that arm acts as an invitation. "Yes I am," he whispers quietly, voice still shaky. His fingers reaching up to tangle into the material of Luther's shirt. "Dad says it all the time. It's, like, his favorite thing to tell me."

He presses his cheek against Luther's ribs, tilting his head up a little to look up at him. "What if I never figure it out? Whu- what do you think Dad'll do, if I can't ever...stop being so scared?"

[obediences]

Luther is the blunt edge compared to Sir Reginald's knife; an indelicate instrument, often, but he's also the softer face of the academy's leadership. Tough-but-fair. A relatable face to catch the kids' insecurities, their weak moments; someone to buoy them after Reginald cuts them down to size.

But at Klaus' question, Luther's first thought comes quick and fleeting, like a deer running panicked through the woods: He'll get rid of you. Like putting down a prized racehorse that can't run anymore. Once he's not of any use anymore, the man might just dispose of him.

And just as that terrified thought skids through his head, hot on its heels comes the followup: Klaus needs to master his powers.

And, Dad wouldn't.

And, ...Would he?

Luther wants to believe he wouldn't, their father wouldn't, but in this moment he can't accurately say either way. Their patriarch is distant, aloof and inscrutable. So Luther grasps onto that shred of desperate hope, wraps himself in it: "He'll train you as far as you can, and that'll just have to be good enough. It'll be okay. And besides, you will figure it out. We're all still getting used to our abilities. It takes as long as it takes."

Even this half-embrace is testament to it: once upon a time, Luther had accidentally broken Klaus' arm, just a twist of the wrist delivered too strongly, unthinkingly. Today, he's careful in how he holds him, like he's handling brittle glass.

[ghostphone]

He knows Luther is trying, he does. But it isn't helping, not really. That kind of practicality might be a comfort to Luther, but it's cold logic that leaves Klaus just as terrified as he already was to start. Nothing really ever helps on nights like this. Except the closeness, and the touch. Warm, and solid against him in a way that lets him know they're real. That he's real. And here. Alive. Not becoming one of the specters that chases him.

He doesn't mean to cry. He knows he shouldn't. Isn't supposed to. "Crying is weakness, Number Four. Weakness is unacceptable." But everything is so terrifying after nights like this, and Luther's attempts at giving him something solid and real to hold onto, as a comfort, are falling so flat, and he can't help it. One sob breaks through the cracks and it opens the whole dam. He lets out a soft whine and curls tighter against his brother, pressing his face against his chest.

[obediences]

Tears are so unfamiliar that it sends another jolt of trepidation through Luther, caught off-guard and out of his element and unsure what to do with his hands -- what do you do with this? Should he pat Klaus' back, awkwardly? Stroke his hair? (Mom would probably have some programming for this.) Do you just give them some space, step away and let them deal with it by themselves? (Luther always wants space when it's him crumbling. Needs to be left alone, to wrestle with it in his own time and with no watching eyes.)

But Klaus is, above all things, needy, and the way he cottons even closer is probably a sign that he wants the company. Hands seizing on Luther's shirt to be as close as possible, an intimacy that he's not used to.

But he does pat Klaus' shoulder, and then just rests his hand there, a comforting weight against his back as he cries. Just lets it out.

And he's at loose ends and still not sure what to do -- (the secret, Number One, is that there is no solution to this, no easy fix); until the thought eventually comes to him. "I can sleep on the floor tonight," he offers. "If you need some company that isn't, uh. That banshee in the closet."

[ghostphone]

The hand on his back is comforting, and he sinks into the touch easily, only moving otherwise to look up at his brother when he makes that suggestion, "Really?" He sounds so hopeful at the idea of it. Klaus is no stranger to crawling into beds of other siblings, but it's Ben and Diego he does that to the most, and it's always so much more surprising if one of them makes the offer themselves. It's different when they offer, instead of just concede to him crashing in their room. "Yes!" He says it so fast, it's like the word is being ripped out of his throat, like if he doesn't say it's okay, that he wants him to stay, that he'll just leave and Klaus will be alone and-- "Please?"