Love Even Near the End; Five Hagreeves

12

Five and I actually get along really well. Surprisingly. He was a little cold-hearted but it was nothing that my warm soul couldn't fix.

Five is honestly really funny. Even without trying. It's something about the way his sarcastic comments come off but he is honestly really really fun to be around.

As Five and I continued talking, I notice him become more comfortable through his body language. It's nice to know that he feels like he can open up to someone. And I feel the same way.

But even the best things come to an end at some point.

As soon as Five and I start to really get into our conversation, Ben walks in with Diego, the lady, Fie, Allison, Sloane, and Luther right behind him.

"Are you just going to sit there and chit chat or are you going to help save the world," Ben says.

Five and I look at each other, now remembering the whole situation of why we're even here.

We get up, following him down to the basement.

"Beautiful isn't it," Fei says, sarcastically as we come to stand in front of the Kugelblitz.

"Oh, wow," Diego says.

The lady scoffs, "That's what took Stanley."

I frown, hearing that Stan is gone. He was a good kid.

"Along with a few other billion people," Fei replies.

"Yeah, who I don't know and don't care about." The lady says, waking around and inspecting the Kugelblitz.

"Right. So it's all about you." Fei says.

"All of us are irrelevant." Five says from beside me, "This thing's gonna take the whole damn universe." He says, moving out from beside me, to also inspect the bright orb.

"What's it made of?" Five asks.

"Micro black holes collapsing at increasingly short intervals." Sloane answers.

"Why aren't we all getting sucked inside?" Five asks.

"Honestly, we don't know. You shouldn't exist here, and neither should this." She says.

"An impossibility for an impossibility." Five mumbles, "The universe is a sucker for balance." He says, clenching his jaw and thinking.

"Grace has been tracking the waves. The next one is due in three hours." Fei says.

"All right, so what do we do?" Diego asks.

"We trap it," Sloane says.

"Dyson sphere?" Five asks.

"Yeah," Sloane replies.

Five clicks of his tongue.

"Okay." He says, walking over to Sloane.

"Confinement factor?" He asks her.

"0.98 at peak energy flux." She says, not breaking eye contact.

I look over at Ben in confusion, wondering what the hell is going on.

"Tensile strength?" He asks once more.

"UTS ceiling of 10,000 gigapascals." She says.

"Should I be finding this hot?" The lady asks.

I laugh at her comment as Diego and Luther reply, "No!"

"What do you think, Five?"

"Could work." He says, "Or we could all die horribly."