Everyone goes to sleep at nine, the same way they do every night, but tonight isn’t every night, tonight is training night.
Klaus wakes up just after midnight to the harsh sound of a cane tapping against the old wooden floor echoing through the hallway and into his room. He sit’s bolt upright, fear building in his throat as his siblings sleep soundly in their beds.
He knows what that sound means, can feel his heart attempting to beat its way out of his chest, as he trains fear filled eyes on the door. He watches, in the light from the moon as the door handle slowly turns, panic filling his lungs until it feels like he can’t breathe, until it feels like he’s choking.
The door opens silently, although it feels like the hinges should creak, like the very house should protest the way Klaus wants to. He flinches back, light streaming in from the open door, leaving Reginald Hargreeves as nothing more than a too familiar silhouette framed by light.
A familiar desire to scream bubbles up in his gut, as he looks at the man, he’s supposed to call Father. Useless pleas claw at his throat, begging to be released from the prison of his lips. His heart is pounding, adrenaline coursing through his veins begging him to act.
He’s tried action before, has tried running, screaming, begging, kicking, punching, everything. When he ran, he was caught, when he screamed, he was scolded, when he fought, he was subdued. He’s kicked and screamed entire nights, only to have Mom carry him to the car without flinching.
He remembers the time Reginald had grown tired of his protests and dragged him by the back of his shirt out of the bedroom.
He has screamed and cried until his throat aches and his tongue tastes like copper. All this adrenaline has never once helped him, only left him locked behind cold bars.
“Number Four, get up.” Reginald orders, his voice laced with steel. There’s never any room for argument in that voice, although that hasn’t always stopped Klaus from trying. He climbs to his feet despair weighing heavily on his heart.
Every cell in his body is telling him to run, but he forces himself to stand on shaky legs. Some small part of him has always been convinced that Reginald will stop the moment he appears unafraid. If he can just force his legs not to shake, his hands not to tremble, if he can chase the fear out of his eyes he’ll be allowed to go back to sleep.
Like every day before, his hands tremble, his knees feel like Jello threatening to collapse beneath him with every step. His fear shines in his eyes, like a desperate plea to be saved.
Despite his fear he walks to the door, holding back a flinch as Reginald’s hand clamps down on his shoulder. It isn’t comforting, it isn’t meant to be. The hand is cold and bony, squeezing too tight for comfort as it steers Klaus out of the room.
As they enter the hallway Klaus turns to Pogo, a plea in his eyes that has been ignored a hundred different times on a hundred different nights like this one. Pogo doesn’t meet his gaze.
Everyone else likes Pogo, he’s the nice one, but here in the dead of night where his eyes can never quite meet Klaus’, Klaus hates him. His cowardice makes Number Four want to snarl, and spit curses and accusations until there isn’t any air left in the room.
The hand on his shoulder tightens, a silent warning, and Klaus holds his tongue, fury simmering just under the surface.
He looks away, shoves down his anger and turns to Mom, the same desperate plea in his eyes. Someone help, anyone, help me. He wants to scream it. Mom just smiles back at him, the same as always.
She can’t help him; she isn’t programmed that way. He knows that. He hates her for it anyways, hates her for smiling that stupid smile on these nights. Hates her for standing there like an impassive machine when all he needs a mom.
He hates her the same way he hates Pogo, he hates them both for leading the way down the hallway, he hates them for driving the car, for locking the door. He hates them for never once letting him out before the night was over.
He hates Reginald more than anything. Hates the man with every fiber of his being, every breath in his lung. He hates Reginald with the type of hatred that burns in your heart, threatens to consume it. The type of hate that would watch the world burn if only he burned with it.
It’s the type of hatred that leaves room for nothing else.
Still, he follows them to the car, and he hates himself a little bit too. Hates that he follows them this time like he did last time, hates himself for giving up on fighting. He hates himself for quietly walking into his own prison.
He climbs into the back seat of his own volition, he doesn’t scream, he doesn’t fight. He sits quietly like he did last time, and the time before. His lungs burn with the desire to scream, to accuse, to curse, and hurt.
He doesn’t speak. He never speaks anymore, not after midnight, not in this car, not on these nights.
