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Ben Hargreeves is a freak.
He's known this for years, as soon as he realised what his so-called powers were. His siblings all have really cool powers. Luther has super strength, Diego can make stuff fly in whatever direction he wants, Allison can basically mind control people and Five can teleport whenever he feels like it. Ben still isn't sure what Klaus' powers are exactly, he doesn't really like to use them or talk about them but he bets they're something cool too.
Ben's powers are different, weird, gruesome, like something out of a horror movie. Ben has tentacled Eldritch monsters from another dimension that can essentially use him as a doorway and this results in massive tentacles bursting out of his chest. It's pretty horrifying to look at.
It feels awful too because the monsters have a mind of their own and Ben feels like he's constantly fighting to keep them under control so they don't massacre everyone in the room every time he lets them out. He thinks of the monsters as 'the horrors' because that's what they are. They're always there, always hovering just under his skin, waiting for him to lose control. It's terrifying, the thought that if he loses focus then the monsters will take over and he won't be able to stop them.
Yeah. Ben is a freak.
//
Ben can't sleep so he sneaks down to the kitchen at the back of the house and curls up in a chair at the end of the table, trying to read his book. But he can't focus on it, the memories of the bank robbery still fresh in his mind.
He took several very long showers when they got back, trying to get the blood off. Not his blood, the robbers' blood. There was so much of it. But even after the fourth shower, he can still feel it on his skin and it makes his flesh crawl.
Somewhere inside him, he feels the horrors' approval at the bloodbath. They like that, they like killing. Ben shudders at the thought of it. That mission had been the first time he'd really had to fight to keep some semblance of control of them. He'd been so close to losing it completely, letting the monsters take over and that thought terrifies him.
He's so lost in his thoughts that he doesn't hear the soft footsteps pad into the kitchen behind him.
'Can't sleep either Benny boy?' a voice says next to his ear, making him jump.
He looks around, ready to make excuses as to why he's sitting in the kitchen at 2 am. But he sees it's just Klaus, and his brother won't be mad or rat him out to their dad.
Klaus hops up onto the table and sits cross legged so he's facing Ben, and fixes him with a concerned expression.
'And I thought I was the nocturnal one.' he says with a parody of a smile. 'What's eatin' ya?'
Ben hesitates, it isn't that he doesn't trust Klaus, he does trust him more than his other siblings but he's not really sure he feels like talking just now.
'Nothing.' he replies eventually. 'Couldn't sleep, that's all.'
Klaus raises his eyebrows so high they're in danger of disappearing into his mass of curly brown hair. Ben knows he doesn't believe him.
'Sorry if I don't buy that.' he says, tilting his head to one side. 'You're a terrible liar, and besides you haven't been your know-it-all self since the bank mission.'
Ben cringes, Klaus is a lot more observant than any of them give him credit for. He still doesn't reply.
' Wellll, ' Klaus says. 'If you're not gonna tell me then you can stay sitting in this draughty old kitchen all night OR we can raid the pantry and have a midnight feast in my lovely cosy bedroom. Up to you.'
He slips, catlike, off the table and opens the pantry door before rifling through it. Ben sighs, picks up his book and joins his brother. If he's going to be up all night, he might as well have company.
//
Klaus' room is like the inside of an oven. It's so bloody hot. He shouldn't really be surprised, his brother is always complaining he's cold for some reason.
Strangely, the Horrors don't seem angry for a change. They don't speak to him and he probably couldn't understand them anyway but they seem curious, wary, impressed. They don't speak with words but Ben understands their meaning well enough, ' powerful, so powerful.' And he knows that they mean Klaus, which is just straight up confusing.
He glances up at his 'powerful' brother, who is currently lounging on his bed, a jar of peanut butter levitating in front of him. He doesn't seem very powerful, not any more than any of his other siblings anyway, so Ben ignores the horrors. God this family is weird.
'Klaus.' he blurts out suddenly.
'Mm?' Klaus replies, and the jar drops onto the bed with a soft thump. He doesn't seem to notice. 'What's up Benerino?'
'Why were you up?' he asks.
Klaus shrugs and stretches his long arms above his head. He's wearing a strange combination of his pyjamas and one of Grace's old silk robes. His tousled curly hair just about reaches his jaw. Ben gives it a week until their dad notices and makes Grace cut it off again.
'Don't sleep much.' Klaus says. 'Ghosts y know, pretty hard to sleep with them screaming at you constantly.'
Ben blinks in confusion, he knows Klaus is telekinetic and then that there's weird levitating thing but ghosts?
Klaus gives him a wicked grin.
'Daddio really didn't tell you huh?' He says, 'I can talk to the dead. Only the dead don't know when to shut up. Dad reckons I could summon them but I've not quite figured that shit out yet.'
Ben's stunned. He has absolutely no idea that his brother could talk to the dead or that the dead gave him such a hard time. He sort of feels sorry for Klaus.
'So theoretically,' he begins. 'If I died…'
'Nope.' Klaus interrupts. 'You're gonna live forever . I'll find a way to make it happen.'
'But if I do.' Ben persists. 'I am gonna haunt the hell out of you.'
Klaus laughs and it's loud in the otherwise quiet bedroom. He grabs a spoon from the bedside table, picks up the peanut butter from the bed and digs in.
'So.' he says, his expression turning serious. 'Now are you gonna tell me what's going on now? You've not been yourself since the last mission.'
Ben bites his lip as he searches for the right words, but there don't seem to be any. So he just goes for the truth, it'll have to do.
'I'm a freak.' he says, twisting his hands together nervously. 'The monsters inside me, they hurt people and one day I won't be able to control them. I'm a monster.'
Klaus looks at him sadly, and runs a hand through his curls.
'You're not a freak Benji.' he says gently. 'If you are, then god knows what that makes me. Just because our powers are a bit spooky, doesn't make us freaks, just different.'
'I…' Ben says. 'Sometimes I feel like the horrors are fighting me and I won't be strong enough to stop them. I'll hurt someone I love. I don't want this.'
'You can control them.' Klaus says. 'I believe you can, and that you won't let them hurt us. You're more powerful than you realise.'
Ben sighs, he should probably listen to Klaus. He's a bit of an expert on having creepy powers, talking to ghosts is definitely up there.
Klaus grins at him and slowly levitates a few inches off the bed so he's sitting cross legged in the air. Ben's pretty used to him doing this by now, he does it a lot when he's relaxed. Sometimes Ben isn't convinced he knows he's doing it until someone points it out. He'll float around the house, hovering a few inches off the floor and won't realise. It's an aspect of his power he doesn't seem to control, it just happens.
'I bet.' Klaus says from his hover spot above the bed. 'If you let the horrors out right now, you could make sure they don't touch me.'
Ben feels the monsters growl softly, they want him to let them out but no, absolutely no chance. He won't risk Klaus just to prove a point. He's starting to feel restless though, like his chest is full of bees. He shakes his head.
'No.' he says bluntly and the monsters' displeasure vibrates under his skin. 'I'm not using you as a guinea pig Klaus.'
'Suit yourself.' Klaus says, dropping back onto the bed with a flump 'But one day you will and it'll be absolutely fine I promise.'
//
They become their own little team after that. They're still part of the Umbrella Academy of course but they're closer than any of the others because they both understand what it's like to have powers that scare you, that seem wrong to other people.
Klaus affectionately refers to them as the spooks sometimes and Ben finds he kind of likes it.
When Ben's had a bad day of training or a rough mission, he likes to hide in his closet where no one can bother him. It's quiet and dark and safe and that's how Ben likes it. If his siblings know where he is, they don't let on and they don't come looking for him.
Well. Klaus is the exception. He seems to be the exception to every rule in existence.
He'll squeeze into the closet beside Ben, and by all rights they shouldn't both fit, especially since Klaus is all limbs these days, long and gangly and somehow elegant at the same time.
But Klaus manages it somehow and he sits beside Ben, his ice cold skin pressed up against Ben's where it's still warm and damp from the long hot showers he takes to try and get the feel of blood off his skin.
Ben understands now why Klaus is so cold all the time, he has one foot in the real world and the other in the void, like he's constantly suspended between the two, not quite part of either one. It's almost like he isn't quite human, he's something different.
Klaus is an enigma wrapped up in a mystery and anyone who tries to figure him out is wasting their time.
Ben finds he doesn't mind the contact, after a bad fight, his skin burns like he's got a fever and the horrors make his whole body vibrate with nervous energy. The cool of Klaus' skin helps with that somewhat.
'They like you y know.' he says to Klaus one evening as they sit crammed together beneath Ben's coats and uniforms.
'Who does?' Klaus says. 'That's very vague brother mine.'
'The horrors' Ben says. 'They're calmer when you're around, I don't have to fight with them as much.'
Ben can only just make out Klaus' face in the semi-darkness but he's absolutely beaming.
'They like me?' he says
No. That's not quite right, Ben thinks to himself. 'Like' is an oversimplification of it so he tries again.
'They're drawn to you I guess.' he says, 'To your powers, it makes them curious. They're not like this with the others.'
'Huh.' Klaus says. 'Well I'm flattered.'
He stretches his arms out luxuriously, which is incredibly impractical in the confined space and almost smacks Ben in the face.
'Oops.' he says. 'Sorry Benny.'
'It's okay.' Ben replies. 'But we're probably getting too big for this, we won't fit soon.'
'Oh sure we will.' Klaus says, snuggling up closer to Ben who winces. He's bruised from training and Klaus is all elbows and knees, all bones and angles.
They're both wearing shorts and t-shirts so there's not even much fabric between them.
Klaus is touchy feely, he always has been. He touches people affectionately without a second thought. He ruffles Diego's hair when he passes him on the landing and tucks an arm around Allison's shoulder when they're laughing together. It's just the way he is . Ben doesn't mind.
'You're so bony ' he complains, but his heart isn't in it. He wishes they could stay small enough to curl up in closets and hide from the world forever.
//
It turns out that Ben isn't the only one who has a hard time.
Ben is not normally an angry person, and he definitely isn't a violent one despite his unfortunate powers. But when he finds out that their father has been locking Klaus in the mausoleum for hours upon hours, with ghosts that terrify him, (he had to wheedle this information out of Klaus who was incredibly reluctant to tell him) Ben feels angrier than he's ever felt in his life.
He'd let the horrors rip Reginald's sorry head off, and he wouldn't try to control it. He doesn't even think he'd be sorry. And the Horrors want to, they're as angry as he is about it, like they're protective of Klaus. And in their way, Ben thinks they are.
Seeing Klaus at the dinner table, the day after these ordeals, seeing his pale drawn face and the dark smudges under his eyes makes Ben so viscerally angry, he could unleash the full force of his powers without a second thought.
The worst days are when Klaus doesn't make it down for dinner at all, because it scares the shit out of Ben, knowing it must have been a particularly bad night.
But logically Ben knows that ripping their father's head off with his tentacles is actually a terrible idea and then his ghost would probably terrorize Klaus as well. So instead he helps in the best way he knows how- by sneaking into Klaus' room if he doesn't make it down for dinner, armed with bars of his favourite chocolate.
They're sitting together on Klaus' bed one evening, Klaus munching chocolate and Ben reading his book. They don't even need to talk really, just having Ben there seems to calm Klaus down.
Klaus is leaning back against the headboard, swamped in one of his apparently endless collection of huge jumpers, this one black and slightly threadbare. He's paired it with a pair of baggy shorts that look like they once belonged to Diego or Luther. Ben doesn't question it. It's not Klaus' weirdest look, not by far.
The monsters inside Ben are acting very weirdly even by their standards, they're humming softly and he can feel them pushing to get out but not because they want to wreak havoc. If he had to put a name to it, he'd say they were concerned , like they want to help. It's a bit of a strange sensation and it makes him shift slightly in discomfort.
And that's when he knows. He's never been more certain of anything in his life. The Horrors will never hurt Klaus. Ben can't tell you how he knows this but he knows it as well as he knows they won't hurt him.
Grace sometimes says that Ben and Klaus are one soul in two bodies and even though Ben doesn't really understand what she means, this is the closest comparison he has.
'Hey Klaus.' he says nervously. 'Can I talk to you a sec?'
'Sure.' Klaus says, putting the empty chocolate wrapper into his bedside table drawer. Ben doesn't miss the hip flask but he doesn't say anything. Sometimes Klaus needs stronger stuff than chocolate.
'So you know how you said you thought I could control the horrors and they wouldn't hurt you?' he asks slowly.
'Mm?' Klaus responds. 'Yeah, vaguely, why?'
'Well.' Ben says. 'I don't think I need to control them, they don't want to hurt you. I don't know why but they don't.'
Klaus cocks an eyebrow at him, Ben knows he must sound slightly insane.
'Okay?' he says. 'Show me.'
Ben blinks, he hadn't expected him to agree just like THAT.
' Be gentle.' Ben thinks. He might not be able to understand the horrors but they definitely understand him. ' Don't scare him.'
And he lets go. There's a momentary sting of discomfort in his chest and then a single tentacle slithers out, slowly, hesitantly and Ben can feel it searching intently.
At the other end of the bed, Klaus backs up slightly as the tentacle inches its way towards him. Ben grits his teeth, he hates that Klaus is scared of his powers, even just a little bit.
The tentacle stops short of Klaus' face and instead lays gently on his shoulder, and just stays there. Ben's never felt so in control of the horrors before, they're so calm and quiet with just a slight tone of concern vibrating under the surface and it's nice . It's nice not to feel like he's going to kill his brother by mistake.
Klaus is openly grinning now as he pats the tentacle that's currently touching his shoulder, some weird blue light glowing on his palm.
'His power' Ben realises. 'That's what the monsters were looking for.'
He can feel them humming in contentment, he wishes he could understand the words that he knows are there but unfortunately Ben doesn't speak dead Eldritch languages.
'You good?' he asks Klaus.
Klaus nods.
'I said you could do it Benny!' he says enthusiastically. 'Look at you go.'
Ben smiles reluctantly at him, it's nice knowing that the horrors aren't all bad.
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