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no_true_pairTitle: The Alien and Adjacent
Fandom: The Umbrella Academy
Pairing/Characters: Marcus Hargreeves & Ben Hargreeves (Number Six)
Rating: G
Content Notes: Mentions of blood, but no violence
Prompt: 1 finds 7's lost [item] and...
Notes: Takes place in a handwavey AU where a teenage Marcus jumps realities and ends up in the Umbrella's world.
Ben is in the courtyard when Marcus finds him after the debrief, freshly showered and back in uniform, patting his pockets, cigarette in one hand.
“You dropped this,” Marcus calls to get his attention, holding out the lighter as he gets closer.
Ben looks up and smiles. “Thanks,” he says softly, reaching out; his hands are shaking a little, and Marcus pretends he doesn’t notice it. There’s a smudge of blood on the lighter where it had been dropped in the gore the Horror left behind, and Ben’s smile fades as he scrubs at it fruitlessly with his thumb for a moment before giving up.
He lights the cigarette, leaning back against a tree, and Marcus sits on a bench. From this angle, from the corner of his eye, this Ben looks nothing like his at all; the posture and the way he moves is all wrong, just like his shakiness and unhappiness is all wrong. Ben usually crows after a good takedown, comparing numbers with anyone who's willing to and waving tentacles around to illustrate his points. He’s generally the loudest voice in the debrief. He’s never off to the side, slinking out the second he’s allowed, and it never takes the others urging him to get him to whip out the Horror.
He turns a little more, so that Ben’s face comes into focus, the only thing about him Marcus finds familiar.
“So,” he says, rubbing at the knee of his uniform, not sure what else to say, because so why don’t you like to fight seems too blunt after only being here a week. “You smoke?” he asks instead.
Ben inhales, and exhales a mouthful of smoke, glancing down at the cigarette in his hand. “Sometimes. Only when I’m spending too much time with Allison,” he says, and the fondness when he talks about his sister is strange, too. Marcus doesn’t think he’s heard that since they were twelve, when dad announced that he’d be choosing a Number One before he let them go on missions, and Ben, always eager to please, had thrown himself into being good enough.
Even before that, Ben had been different, harder than this new version of him — Marcus hadn’t seen Ben flinch at having to bring out the Horror or at fighting somebody since they were seven, until this last week. But he’d been friendlier before he set his sights on being Number One. The two of them used to have jokes together, they used to share books. Ben used to have one of Fei’s birds perched on his shoulder as often as not; he used to draw Sloane places she wanted to go; he used to talk about them with a little fondness in his voice, too.
Marcus didn’t think he really missed it. But the way this Ben’s voice softens around his sister’s name makes his stomach churn with sudden jealousy.
“Does that happen often?”
“Yeah,” Ben says, and hesitates. “Do you spend a lot of time with… your Ben?”
“Only training,” he says, and tries to keep his voice even. From the way Ben’s eyes flick over to him, Marcus doesn’t think he succeeds.
“You’re not close?”
He shrugs. “We work well together. He’s a good Number One. We just don’t talk much.”
Ben opens his mouth, and then closes it again without saying anything, before lifting his cigarette again. The silence drags on between them long enough to feel awkward; Marcus wants to break it, but he isn’t sure what else to say. His eyes wander across the courtyard, trying to figure out if the best thing to do is excuse himself and leave Ben to his post-mission cooldown.
“You should come with us to Griddy’s tonight,” Ben says abruptly, before Marcus can speak, and his eyes snap back to him. Ben isn’t looking at him, fidgeting with the edge of his hoodie. “If you want. Most of us go after a rough mission, usually. You fought, so you should come.”
Marcus isn’t sure what or where Griddy’s is, but he can recognize an olive branch when he’s offered one, and after a week of awkward silences and even more awkward questions, this one feels like he passed some weird test. “Okay.”
Ben glances up. “Okay,” he echoes, and a soft smile flashes across his face. It’s no more familiar than most things about him, and it fits him better than Marcus could have expected.
Fandom: The Umbrella Academy
Pairing/Characters: Marcus Hargreeves & Ben Hargreeves (Number Six)
Rating: G
Content Notes: Mentions of blood, but no violence
Prompt: 1 finds 7's lost [item] and...
Notes: Takes place in a handwavey AU where a teenage Marcus jumps realities and ends up in the Umbrella's world.
Ben is in the courtyard when Marcus finds him after the debrief, freshly showered and back in uniform, patting his pockets, cigarette in one hand.
“You dropped this,” Marcus calls to get his attention, holding out the lighter as he gets closer.
Ben looks up and smiles. “Thanks,” he says softly, reaching out; his hands are shaking a little, and Marcus pretends he doesn’t notice it. There’s a smudge of blood on the lighter where it had been dropped in the gore the Horror left behind, and Ben’s smile fades as he scrubs at it fruitlessly with his thumb for a moment before giving up.
He lights the cigarette, leaning back against a tree, and Marcus sits on a bench. From this angle, from the corner of his eye, this Ben looks nothing like his at all; the posture and the way he moves is all wrong, just like his shakiness and unhappiness is all wrong. Ben usually crows after a good takedown, comparing numbers with anyone who's willing to and waving tentacles around to illustrate his points. He’s generally the loudest voice in the debrief. He’s never off to the side, slinking out the second he’s allowed, and it never takes the others urging him to get him to whip out the Horror.
He turns a little more, so that Ben’s face comes into focus, the only thing about him Marcus finds familiar.
“So,” he says, rubbing at the knee of his uniform, not sure what else to say, because so why don’t you like to fight seems too blunt after only being here a week. “You smoke?” he asks instead.
Ben inhales, and exhales a mouthful of smoke, glancing down at the cigarette in his hand. “Sometimes. Only when I’m spending too much time with Allison,” he says, and the fondness when he talks about his sister is strange, too. Marcus doesn’t think he’s heard that since they were twelve, when dad announced that he’d be choosing a Number One before he let them go on missions, and Ben, always eager to please, had thrown himself into being good enough.
Even before that, Ben had been different, harder than this new version of him — Marcus hadn’t seen Ben flinch at having to bring out the Horror or at fighting somebody since they were seven, until this last week. But he’d been friendlier before he set his sights on being Number One. The two of them used to have jokes together, they used to share books. Ben used to have one of Fei’s birds perched on his shoulder as often as not; he used to draw Sloane places she wanted to go; he used to talk about them with a little fondness in his voice, too.
Marcus didn’t think he really missed it. But the way this Ben’s voice softens around his sister’s name makes his stomach churn with sudden jealousy.
“Does that happen often?”
“Yeah,” Ben says, and hesitates. “Do you spend a lot of time with… your Ben?”
“Only training,” he says, and tries to keep his voice even. From the way Ben’s eyes flick over to him, Marcus doesn’t think he succeeds.
“You’re not close?”
He shrugs. “We work well together. He’s a good Number One. We just don’t talk much.”
Ben opens his mouth, and then closes it again without saying anything, before lifting his cigarette again. The silence drags on between them long enough to feel awkward; Marcus wants to break it, but he isn’t sure what else to say. His eyes wander across the courtyard, trying to figure out if the best thing to do is excuse himself and leave Ben to his post-mission cooldown.
“You should come with us to Griddy’s tonight,” Ben says abruptly, before Marcus can speak, and his eyes snap back to him. Ben isn’t looking at him, fidgeting with the edge of his hoodie. “If you want. Most of us go after a rough mission, usually. You fought, so you should come.”
Marcus isn’t sure what or where Griddy’s is, but he can recognize an olive branch when he’s offered one, and after a week of awkward silences and even more awkward questions, this one feels like he passed some weird test. “Okay.”
Ben glances up. “Okay,” he echoes, and a soft smile flashes across his face. It’s no more familiar than most things about him, and it fits him better than Marcus could have expected.