April of Angst and Whump, Day Twenty-Four
still on catch up, 8 to go after this.
more from Vessels, the supernatural/Originals xover- Klaus gets the worst wake up call as Finn arrives at his new with news of thier dad and brother vanishing on a hunt Klaus/Aurora, and look who managed to steal a pov and part of the piece for herself.
For @whumpril 2025 day 24 -Sensory Overload
For @chaos-company's Angstpril 2025 day 24 - "it would have been fine"
---
Klaus was woken by knocking at his door, the sound did nothing for his throbbing head.
He had thrown a party to celebrate his art expedition, and the sale of his most expensive piece yet.
He wasn’t in need of the money, he had paid for Kol and Rebekah’s schooling and both had refused to live off his money since and he had enough regular rich clients that would come to him every few months for a new piece to keep him going.
What he would have spent the money one was for Elijah to accept his offer to actually finish school, like Klaus knows Elijah wants to, but his brother was annoyingly stubborn. Elijah wouldn’t give up hunting until dad and Finn did and while Klaus wasn’t sure why Finn kept it up, dad was going to keep going until he found the thing that killed mum or died.
Klaus pushed himself out of bed as the knocking continued, attempting not to wake Aurora as he did and failing and blamed the sudden tremor of his hands on the night before.
So he had no grand reason to celebrate the purchase but a reason to get completely wasted and try a few new things was never something to turn down.
He yanked the door open ready to shout and blinked at the person on the other side.
It took him a moment to recognise the person and why they would be at his door.
“Dad finally get himself killed?” he asked Finn, he ignored the pitch in his stomach, dad’s death would be a relief and completely of his own doing.
He chose avenging a death woman over his own children and Henrik-
“They’re missing.” Finn’s voice brought his thoughts to a end.
He was about to shug until his sluggish brain caught the first word, they, as in plural as in the dick himself and someone else, someone who came to his door much more common and was a notable absence.
“Where’s Elijah?” the question escaped him even as he didn’t need to ask, desperately didn’t want the answer.
Finn was silent, Klaus stared waiting hoping his other older brother would appear behind Finn, ready to fuss over him and his hungover and lecture him over his less than healthy lifestyle.
Elijah didn’t appear, instead Klaus’ guests started to wake and wander in disconnected mumbles, swears and complaints mixing together and growing the light behind Finn was starting to blind him, it was getting to be too much.
A hand on his shoulder made him snap.
“EVERYONE OUT!” he screamed, freezing all his guests, his brother however unsurprised by it simply stepped over the threshold and into his home without invitation.
Elijah always asked.
Asks, he mentally corrected himself, he’s not dead, missing not dead, it went around his head like a mantra, Finn hadn’t found a body so Elijah would still ask in the future, once Finn and Klaus found him.
And Klaus used this to force his stupid older brother to give up on dad and move in with him, maybe dad was dead and Elijah alive and this whole thing would push both Finn and Elijah to give up.
Give up, accept they were orphans and stay away from the supernatural, hadn’t it taken enough, scarred them enough.
A dozen voices called to him in questioning tones, as Klaus found himself frozen, overwhelmed by the mantra, the possibility of Elijah’s death, his headache and the noises around him.
“Klaus?”
“Nicky?”
“Niklaus?”
“My love.” Aurora's soft voice was closest and the only one that mattered, he blinked down, her wide blue eyes looking at him in concern. “What’s wrong?”
She reached for his face and he was about to lean into the touch when a glass of water was pushed between them, Finn looked at them coolly.
“Family emergency.” Finn explained curtly, his voice carrying through the room, causing others to start and overlap.
“Klaus, you need-”
“We can-”
“I’ll-”
“What i need,” he cut through the voices, forcing his tone to stay calm “is you all to leave. This is family business.” he loathed the last words as they left his mouth, family business what dad called hunting before Klaus understood it, realised how few hunters lived a long life.
Even with his forced calm they quickly left, they were all aware of his temper.
Aurora was the last to leave, eyes offering help, all he had to do was ask.
But he couldn’t do that, couldn’t endanger her.
Mama’s wide blue eyes stared at him in fear and confusion, they glazed over.
Henrik’s eyes are brown and not confused but that doesn’t make it worse because it makes the fear in them louder.
He ran a hand through her silky strands of red hair and kissed her.
“I’ll explain later.” he promised as she finally stepped out the door he watched her leave until she was out of sight and then he shut the door and twisted.
Finn stood there still holding the glass and a pair of painkillers in his other hand.
Klaus wasted no time stalking to him and snatch the pill and dry swallow before taking the glass and downing it.
“How?” he snapped, hand tightening on the glass, he wanted to throw it break something but knew it would do nothing but grant him Finn’s judgement.
He wanted Elijah.
“I don’t-” Finn started and Klaus waved him away, he didn’t want to know how they disappeared, they would be working that out themselves. “Why was Elijah alone with dad?” he asked.
“Dad called for help and-” Finn begun and Klaus cut him off again,
“Why didn’t you go with them?” he demanded, his frustration growing as Finn looked away, “WHY?”
“I had a date.” Finn admitted quietly.
“What?” he choked, the shock stealing his rage for a moment.
“I had a date with Sage.” Finn answered and Klaus recognised the name as the one Elijah had talked of, over a year ago, it was serious then, since Finn and Elijah still moved across the country on sporadic hunts and yet this woman kept up or Finn made sure he went back to her at least.
He pushed that away, great, Finn possibly had an out from the life that father brought them up in, the war he trained them for and it costs them Elijah.
“You sent him off with dad alone because you had a date” he stated
"it would have been fine-should have." Finn argued “Elijah agreed to go instead; it was only meant to be a few days.”
“Yet it wasn’t.”
“I KNOW!” Finn roared his hand hitting the wall behind.
They all had dad’s temper, but the oldest of their number had worked hard to control it so getting an outburst from either of them was rare, Finn most of all, Klaus looked at his brother, really looked, the bags under his eyes and shadow of stubble.
“How long?” he asked the question he should have started with.
“Three days,” Finn answered, focused on his hand, flexing it, it would be bruised, Klaus had made sure his wall would withstand his temper. “I went to the town the hunt was meant to be when they didn’t turn up, turned it upside down, one dead vampire and nothing else.”
“They were hunting vampires?”
“No.” Finn shook his head “I found a note from Elijah he thought it was a set up, that the vampire was bait.”
“A note?” he questioned, vampires as bait was clearly a trap for hunters unless there was something else that was drawn to them that they didn’t know about, but a note meant Elijah was aware of that and still stuck around, was still caught by it apparently
“Hidden in their motel room.” Finn told him, right where Elijah knew they would find it no doubt’
“He knew prepared for it to go wrong.” he sighed because that was Elijah more concerned about preparing those after him than looking after himself.
His home was silent after that because it clearly had gone wrong, but how wrong they still had to find out.
“We should going then.” he said as the quiet grew heavier.
“Your bleeding,” Finn pointed out, without the warm concern that Elijah would have had, and Klaus looked to where Finn was gesturing, four pricks on red on his white t-shirt on his shoulder, just where Aurora’s hand had been.
He shrugged it off, Aurora kept her nails sharp, it was fun, she probably accidentally grabbed him too tight when he shouted. “I’ll change.” he told his brother, as he pulled off the shirt and ducked back into his room to change into a new set that didn’t carry the smell of the night before.
It was as he left the room that he froze again, Finn was standing in front of his finished paintings, those that weren’t good enough to show or that would never be shown despite their quality, he knew what Finn was looking at before he turned slowly and lifted one of the latter.
"What really happened to mum?" Finn asked as he held up one of his paintings.
His younger self looked back, blood splattered across his face and burning yellow eyes.
Klaus flinched, there was a reason those paintings and sketches burned, much like mum that night, before anyone else saw them.
“Why ‘lijah?” he had asked, standing in the flickering light of their burning house, as Elijah tried to clean mama’s blood off of him. Finn stood away trying to calm Henrik down and Father was talking to the firemen with Kol and ‘Bekah in his arms.
He remembered his body acting without his control, yellow eyes in the mirror, as it cut his hand open and tried to feed the blood to baby Henrik, as mama found them and tried to stop them.
As the thing inside him waved a hand and silenced her, covering him in her blood before it made fire appear in his hands and dropped in on mama, even as Elijah tried to stop him, burning himself.
But Elijah had claimed it was him when Father burst in, that he had killed mama and he couldn't stop himself.
“It’s-” Elijah had choked, “my fault, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” Klaus had been stunned as Elijah pulled him into a hug and had just cried with him.
He was four, his big brother knew everything so he never questioned it again.
Sometimes he managed to pretend their lie was the truth and it wasn’t his body that killed her.
The dreams always corrected him and for the first time as he saw the familiar horror as Finn traced the pison yellow paint, he realised maybe Finn and Elijah were hiding their own secrets from him.
“How about we find our brother and Mikael first,” he replied, projecting a careless air and grabbing a pair of sunglasses to block the light from his still sensitive eyes and his go bag, even after years of getting a normal life, after completely swearing off hunting he hadn’t managed to completely lose that habit. “Then we can rehash old history.”
“History-” Finn hissed before sighing, clearly thinking of any delays the discussion would cause and the fact they really needed the other person for it. “Fine.”
Klaus opened the door and stepped out of his apartment leaving it to Finn to close up and refused to look at his own car as he went to Finn’s.
Tossing his bag in the back and crashing in the front seat he tried to sleep before Finn joined him, he’d explain to Aurora and tell Kol and Rebekah, as he doubted Finn had yet, and see what weapons Finn had in the boot once he woke up.
Hopefully with less of a hangover and closer to getting Elijah back.
—
Aurora pouted on the rooftop, as she watched the car drive away with her Niklaus, she was enjoying her time with him, she had even taken the effort to dust off and revive her original body instead of simply possessing a similar looking human.
She had been planning to ask Tristan if she could keep him, and she would have to ask him because her brother would be the one needed to break her dear Nik in Hell.
As much as she liked hurting him and vice versa, but that was with his consent and she wouldn’t ruin what they have with breaking that, breaking him.
She wasn’t her brother who would likely take joy in that, he was very good at getting his toys to thank him for the pain before he grew bored of them and sent them away.
Niklaus loved her and her, him, she had forgotten what that felt like when he didn’t involve her brother.
The lords of hell don’t let lesser demons touch what is theirs, and she had decided Nik was hers.