[for Luther] - Canon Update

[fifthbeatle]

He wakes up with a terrible headache in the wee hours, the new day's color not yet streaked in the sky.

Viktor's power doesn't give him a hangover, nor did he drink last night. Yet, he's groggy, awakening into a strange, barely-conscious space. It's almost like the pill-hangover he'd get when he took a few too many of Hargreeves' suppressive pills.

Reginald Hargreeves, the image of him, is seared into Viktor's mind, cruel and sneering and alive. Other shapes and vague concepts try and assemble themselves, but Viktor won't let them. It's just a dream. A really fucking bad dream. With meditation and stubbornness, Viktor finds sleep again.

The next time he wakes up, it's with a start, a gasp, feet flipping the covers off of his body like that time one of his young, asshole siblings dropped bugs in his bed. The pain in his head isn't a feeling, it's a sound, like the first time he knew he and Harlan were connected. Oh, fuck, Harlan. Harlan.

Young Harlan, sitting up gasping for air that wasn't ever Viktor's to give. The boy he knew, terrified, his sneakers finally touching down on the hay of the barn floor. Harlan as an old man, swinging a thrall of yellow lights, tearing into Viktor's body, painful and chaotic, but guided with love. The sprawl of marigold gifts he gave. Harlan dead. Harlan's dead.

Viktor is up on his feet now, possessed. He stares hard at the sheets, like maybe they're drugged. A hand goes to touch his hair... and there's much less of it. Synapses are still firing. Viktor grabs the first shirt he can find and ducks into it. Since there are no mirrors in his room, he dashes out to the bathroom, and stares.

Liking what he sees doesn't lessen the panic of seeing himself so changed. It's right, Viktor has no doubt, has always known -- it's not about that. It's about yesterday, and what happened between then and today. Fuck, what did he do yesterday?? He had lessons, didn't he?

No! No, yesterday was Luther's wedding. They were drunk. Like, really drunk. And today. Today is... weird. It feels weird.

Yet, he feels great. He looks great. This is who he is. The feeling of looking in the mirror and seeing him is... indescribable. Singular. Like when he found out that Hargreeves--

"Oh, shit. Luther," Viktor breathes. Nothing quite makes sense, he doesn't know what is real, and he is panicking. When he sprints to Luther's room and he isn't there, Viktor starts to freak out. Tears sting his eyes as he walks a small, barefoot circle, a hand rubbing at the back of his neck. What is going on with him? How will he know where to look for Luther if he doesn't know what's real?

Comments

[number1_himbo]

The morning starts predictably for Luther.

Unaware of the weird phenomenon once again wrapping around a family member, he's up just before dawn, and out for a run. The stuff with Klaus sits uncomfortably in the back of his head, all the more reason to push some more serotonin into his brain. It's not running away from a problem. He's running with a problem, and it's not really a problem. Shouldn't be a problem.

Wouldn't be a problem if Luther trusted any new development that involves their excuse for a father.

By the time Luther hits a lovely, tree-lined avenue not far from the house, he's feeling a lot better. His blood's pumping, the sun has fully risen and beams down on his back-- a promising start for a great day. If not great, then good, which is absolutely nothing to thumb his nose up about. About any day in Darrow beats the majority of days in the other timelines.

The other timelines, not about to take this narrative bullshit, bite back.

Luther hits a brand new crack in the pavement, feels both his feet come off the ground--

--and then he's in several places at once. The farm. The briefcase. The Sparrow Academy. Hotel Oblivion. He lives another week, only it's a Hargreeves week, so it might as well be a year. He gets his heart broken and mended. He gets married.

He dies.

Klaus brings him back, for a moment or two.

He dies again, and then he's flat on his stomach in Darrow coughing on blood that he's pretty sure is just from his nose. People have gathered to try and help him up, so he gently pushes them aside.

Only one place to go, and Luther sprints there, holding some scrap of fabric given to him by a bystander, trying to staunch the nosebleed. Luther nearly tears the door off the hook, storming into the house. "HELLO? IS ANYONE HERE?"