Hollow ” Klaus Mikaelson × Male!Oc! 13.

Chapter Thirteen: 

“Alright people, huddle up, huddle up.” Sai calls them over into the kitchen, outfit as classy as ever. She’s dressed in a coffee coloured pencil skirt and a white button up with pretty frills near the buttons. She’s paired up her outfit with a dark coloured blazer and black stiletto heels. Her usual shades are sat upon the bridge of her nose, perfectly hiding her eyes. 

“It’s Sunday,” Sherry says, tone flat, “why the fuck did you call us here?” Her left eyebrow twitches as she speaks, “what’s the point of even closing the diner up if all you fuckers still manage to get inside?”

“Ha,” Kol laughs, smirk wide. “No point at all.” 

He then dodges an assault of Sherry’s hand, sticking his tongue out at her childishly. Before the two can even start a squaffle, Elijah steps in between them, smile fond as he keeps the two apart. “As much as I like being around all of you on a wonderful Sunday morning, aren’t we missing someone?” He questions. 

“Well,” Sai starts, holding the kitchen door open with her foot. A clipboard along with a fountain pen suddenly appear in her hands, forming from out of thin air. She clears her throat. “Let’s see… Elijah? Yes, he’s here,” she ticks something off on the clipboard, “Finn, Klaus, Kol,” three more ticks, “Rebekah, Sherry and me… no, we’re all here.” 

“Zero,” Klaus grunts, lips forming into a displeased scowl, “we’re missing Zero.”

“Yeah,” Rebekah nods, “where’s the cook?” 

“Where’s the tiramisu?” Finn adds quietly, distraught over the fact that he can’t see the dessert anywhere.

Kol’s mouth falls open into a loud gasp. “Where’s the ice cream?” 

“You called us here and you can’t even control us, go figure,” Sherry shoves her hands into the pockets of her jacket, sighing dramatically. 

Behind her sunglasses, Sai rolls her eyes. There’s one thing the crowd wants collectively and she has it — well sort of. She just needs everyone to get into the kitchen. Why did they have to be so stubborn about it? Gah. 

“I have cute videos of Zero,” she gambles. “ Annnnd… pictures of him from kindergarten.”

Which is both a stretch and a lie, but oh well. 

At once, everyone in the dinner looks towards her with rapt attention.

Bingo.

“If you could all just get into the kitchen–“

“Out of my way,” Rebekah cuts her off, forcing her way past Sai and into the kitchen. Stumbling, Sai catches her balance and waits as everyone shuffles past her, murmuring about how badly they want to see the videos. Sai can’t help but smirk, wide and ravenous. The clipboard and pen disappear as she closes the door behind her with a click. At once, the kitchen twists, colours turning and lights switching, everything morphs into something else until it looks like a mini cinema. There are a handful of red seats, nice and plush. The room is now dark, dimly lit by the large screen built into the far wall. To their side is a trolley filled with popcorn and other refreshments. 

“Ladies and gents,” Sai claps her hands for attention. She moves to the front of the room and stands in front of the screen, all business and professional.

Sherry makes a face. “Sai, what the fuck.” 

“Shh,” Finn shushes, leading the plum haired  female to take a seat beside him, “this actually looks promising.”

“Surprisingly,” Kol can’t help but mutter underneath his breath.

“Refreshments are to the side. Toilets are here,” Sai points somewhere into the distance and then to her left, “and here. Please make sure to be quiet during the movie. Questions are to be kept for the end. Thank you.” She then promptly sits next to Klaus, crossing one leg over the other. With a snap of her fingers the large screen comes fully to life, colours flashing and objects forming.

The movie starts to play. In the first scene, the cherry blossoms are in full bloom, the sun is high up in the sky and the gentle breeze is swaying pink petals throughout the air.

Somewhere in the back, Sherry chokes.

Sai waves her hand and promptly shuts her up with her magic. 

She can’t have her wife ruining her plans.

If Zero won’t talk about his issues and what not, that’s fine. Sai will just have to tell the story for him.

—-

//. the day i met you, wasn’t the first. surely we had met before, much, much earlier. you just pretend we didn’t and i couldn’t quite remember. then again, we had both changed our hair colour. maybe as a way to cope with our terrible pasts. or just maybe so we wouldn’t stand out so much. — Sherry. //

September this year is warm. Much warmer than the year before. Zero walks down the many streets of western Japan, barely paying attention to the hoards of children walking past him to get on time to their first day of elementary school. He pauses in his steps to gaze at himself in the nearby glass window of a corner shop. He’s dressed in the classic japanese uniform for middle school. Plain, black and white — sort of cute. Just like a uniform should be. His dark coloured hair is ruffled and there are dark circles underneath his grey eyes. He straightens out his bangs in the glass and then slowly moves on.

Today is his official welcoming ceremony. It’s his first day of middle school and he’s sour about it. Zero would have rather stayed at home, buried under several blankets, sleeping the days away. He kicks at a nearby rock and watches it skid across the ground and into a nearby wall. 

When he gets close enough to school grounds, he eyes the closed gates with a raised brow. A few students are stud in front of it, dyed hair and piercings, untucked shirts and sneakers, some of them even have tattoos.

Ah. The delinquents.

Zero stops just behind them, tilting his head to get a look at whoever’s stood on the other side of the gate. It’s a female, with shoulder length black hair and dark brown eyes. She’s unbelievably pale, so pale actually, that she could probably blend into the colour white. Her arms are crossed over her chest, showcasing the red band wrapped around her bicep. Zero squints his eyes to read the golden letters stitched into the red material. ‘Student Council,’ it reads. And underneath it, ‘Class President.’

Zero can’t help but snort. 

The female taps her foot restlessly against the ground. “I won’t be letting any of you in until you fix your appearances. The nerve of you lot, coming in an hour late when you all know damn well that we’re holding a ceremony for the new first years today.” 

“Tch. Who cares about that. Let us in,” one of the delinquents demands. The others agree, loud and aggressive.

Zero rolls his eyes. He pushes past the group, ignores the insults they hurl his way and shrugs off his backpack. He throws it over the top of the gates and watches as the backpack flies over and lands on the other side, right at the President’s feet. The female stares at him in confusion, blinking slowly. She smells oddly familiar. Perhaps Zero has met her before? He hums, but doesn’t acknowledge the notion. 

“What are you doing?” She asks. 

In favour of ignoring her, Zero climbs up the tall gate with swift and nimble movements, barely pausing for breath until he’s at the top.

“Hey! Are you crazy? You’ll injure yourself.”

Huffing out a quiet laugh, Zero jumps down and lands on his feet, low to the ground and crouching. He grabs his backpack as he stands back up to his height and swings it over his shoulder. 

The President’s eyes are wide and her mouth is slightly parted. She scrunches up her eyebrows and something like recognition sparks in her dark eyes. 

Zero hopes she doesn’t remember him. Because he vividly remembers her now. She had been stuck in a room made of four plain walls, sharp needles were her day to day torture, electrical tests were circulated straight to her brain–

And Zero had saved her. Had forced his way into that shrewd building on the outskirts of a nearby town, had killed everyone in sight and then found her. Nameless and scared, wired up to machines. She had looked at him with dark eyes, skin pale and hair coloured like plums, limbs shaky and lips closed tight to not let any sounds out. He had reached out to her, placed his warm hand on her cold cheek and smiled. Told her it was okay and that the bad guys were gone, weren’t ever going to hurt her again. And even though he was covered in blood, smelled like iron and copper, like death itself, she had trusted him. And as soon as he had her safely tucked away, he left.

Zero was no longer the same person. He wasn’t kind, he wasn’t merciful — he was a monster, through and through. He was a child, forced to play by anothes rules. He’ll change that, soon enough.

“It’s you…,” the female breathes out, voice shaky. Her gaze trails up to Zero’s hair and she frowns. “Your hair… isn’t orange.” She laughs but it sounds forced, fake. “Nevermind. Sorry, I thought you were someone else.”

Above them, the wind tussles the nearby cherry blossoms and from that, small petals the lightest shade of pink fall down onto them. 

Zero’s chest burns, burns, burns. 

But he’s long learned to ignore the feeling. So he goes on, moves on and doesn’t ever look back.

Until, of course, he has to. 

1621 words//unedited.