Chapter Text
There hadn’t been time to get over the joy of returning to 2019, thankfully , before finding out that not only was their father alive, he wasn’t their father anymore, Ben was alive again, but wasn’t their Ben, and that their no longer father had replacement kids of them, The Sparrow Academy. There was even less time for the former Umbrella Academy, now Team Zero, apparently, to prepare themselves before the entirety of The Sparrow Academy had descended upon them.
To make Reginald’s long, drawn out monologue short, unless there was a way for them, Team Zero, to guarantee they wouldn’t ruin this alternate timeline, universe, world, Vanya didn’t know what to call wherever the hell they are exactly, and if there wasn’t, Reginald was going to have The Sparrows kill them all. But , Vanya did know a way to ensure nothing would happen to this alternate place, or her siblings.
And all it took was one sentence, “I am the apocalypse.” And she had her one way ticket to Hotel Oblivion, alone.
The menacing Hotel Oblivion, which apparently is on the dark side of the moon, became even more decrepit on the inside than the building appeared on the outside. (The opening and closing curtains Vanya had seen on her guided trip from some space lab Reginald had only unsettled her more than she thought she could be. Which must’ve been where Luther was for four years. ) The pleas and cries from her siblings repeating in her mind, trying to either come with her, keep her with them, or promises of rescue. Even when she tried to help them, to save them, she only managed to hurt them.
Apparently the televator wasn’t working, more likely Reginald’s hatred of her transcended universes and he didn’t want to waste the energy on her to use the televator; so she was being guided from the space station, across the goddamn moon, to Hotel Oblivion by a little robot, who, upon learning the robot had no name, was named Ben by Vanya.
But, as quickly as robot Ben rolled into her life, just as Vanya was within a few steps of the Hotel, he left her with a beep, which Vanya took as a goodbye, and watched as he rolled away before being engulfed by Hotel Oblivion.
The lobby, or what used to be the lobby, of Hotel Oblivion looked like it had once been moderately refined. But the shattered chandeliers, chipped marbled (for some goddamn reason) floors, splintering wooden reception desk, smashed adorning light fixtures (some could still flicker), and the walls having some reddish-brown paint smeared across it, ruined whatever level of pristine the lobby had been.
While Vanya had been taking in the lobby of where she’d be living for an undetermined amount of time, possibly for the rest of her life, god that’s terrifying to think about , something or someone, bumped into her. And when she turned to look at who or what had bumped into her, Vanya found a person, maybe , in a bellhop uniform but they had no face and greyed skin.
The bellhop bent down and grabbed a suitcase with a sparrow mark on it that had been sitting near her feet, she hadn’t noticed it, and got handed a set of keys from the board behind the desk by another bellhop. Where were these people? Aliens? Creatures coming from? The first bellhop lead her from the lobby into an elevator.
Vanya tried to make small talk with the bellhop, forgetting they had no mouth to reply with, throughout the elevator ride and the further walk to wherever the hell the bellhop was leading her. While they walked, Vanya made a comment, a joke really, about something pointless but as they passed a room with the door cracked open, a voice hissed to them, or maybe just to her, “The phone never rings.” before a clawed hand pulled the door closed with a slam.
What the fuck does that mean? The phone never rings?
She didn’t even bother trying to ask the bellhop for any clarification as to what that could possibly mean. Vanya resigned herself to having far more questions than answers she’d get for the duration of her stay in Oblivion, and instead took the remainder of the walk to presumably her room as time to observe more of the near ruins the Hotel had been left in. A reddish-brown stain on the floor told her that what had been on the walls of the lobby was very much not paint, and something had happened in the Hotel that caused its guests to turn on one another.
Vanya didn’t want to find out what had been the catalyst for it.
The bellhop suddenly stopped in the middle of the hallway, Vanya nearly crashing into them. The bellhop unlocked the door to room, the number on the door reading 537, put the suitcase just inside the room, handed her the key, then pushed her in when she didn’t move and closed the door with a slam. Looking around the room, Vanya was annoyed that the guests of Hotel Oblivion had better rooms, which were actually furnished and spacious, than she had at The Academy for years, but regardless there were two objects in the room that were drawing her attention. The suitcase, and the television.
She grabbed the suitcase and dropped it on the bed, Vanya quickly pulled the straps that had been holding the suitcase closed and watched as it fell open. There were, surprisingly, a few items in the suitcase, a journal and 2 pencils, some basic hygienic items, one change of clothes, and a self-help book entitled ‘Be A Better You: Your Life In Hotel Oblivion’ written by none other than Reginald Hargreeves.
As much as Vanya wanted to either toss the book out the window or simply burn it, the windows wouldn’t open and she had nothing to burn it with. So she just shoved it under the bed, out of sight out of mind and all that, and turned her attention to the television.
When it turned on, blacks, whites, and greys filling the screen, there was the sparrow image, again, the same one imprinted on the suitcase, then there was a cartoon of a mouse-bug walking, finding a hole in the ground, finding another mouse-bug in the hole and pulled them out, the second mouse-bug ripped their eyes out soon after, and the darkness (was it supposed to be blood?) spilling from the second mouse-bug’s eyes spread to the first, both being engulfed in the darkness, the cartoon showed the mouse-bug, not covered in whatever that was, trapped in the eye of the infected, corrupted, dark mouse-bug before Vanya clicked the screen off.
She debated about what to do next, she could stay in her room and stare at the same 4 walls until something, or someone , made her leave or she could go explore some of the corners of Oblivion, and hope she didn’t run into anyone that would want her head on a pike.
But as fate would have it, Vanya didn’t have a choice in the matter as there was some rather forceful pounding on her door. She didn’t think to use the peephole on her door before pulling it open, assuming it had just been the bellhop, and that assumption would be what would lead to another week of hell in Vanya’s life.
As soon as she opened the door the slightest bit, a hand from the other side grabbed the door and shoved it open, nearly knocking Vanya to the ground. The owner of the hand crossed the threshold of her room, two others filing in behind them. And when Vanya recognized the three figures that had barged into her room.
The Murder Magician. The Conductor. And, the worst of them all, Dr. Terminal.
“Look what we’ve got here gentlemen,” Dr. Terminal said, evidently the leader of at least this small group, maybe the entirety of Hotel Oblivion, “yet another guest, checking into the glorious Hotel Oblivion forever .” What? No! She was here forever?! There were hands on her shoulders and she was being pushed out into the hallway as Dr. Terminal called behind her “Let’s give this little darling a warm, Hotel Oblivion welcome.”
The hallway outside her room was filled with various other villains, ‘guests’ in Hotel Oblivion. Some of them she could recognize from within the sea of faces, most she couldn’t. “What’s your name Darling ?” Dr. Terminal purred into Vanya’s ear, sending an unnerving shudder down her back.
“Vanya.” She wold him, internally wincing. With bated breath she waited for them to pounce on her, tear her limb from limb, and when they didn’t, and none of them seemed to recognize her, Vanya only then realized they would have no memory of her or her connection with The Umbrella Academy.
To them, she had no ties to superheroes.
To them, she was one of them.
She belonged.
“Vanya.” Dr. Terminal repeated, as if he were trying out her name on his tongue, “Well Vanya , we have an exhilarating time planned. Just, for, you, my darling.”
Whatever semblance of belonging Vanya felt with some of the most notorious villains she’d ever heard of didn’t distract her well enough from the putrid green hallways or the common room that she was being led towards that she hadn’t seen before. From what Vanya could see approaching the room, there were even more people waiting in the room for them, surrounding something she couldn’t quite see.
But she would quickly learn that what was waiting for her, would be one of the top ten, if not top five, worst experiences in Vanya’s life.
In the midst of the crowd there was a modified dentist’s chair with restraints and a tray with various objects, a small vial of pink liquid, a syringe, and a makeshift gag she would learn later, but was only seen by Vanya once the crowd parted for the three people behind her. By the time Vanya realized what was likely about to happen, there were two forceful grips on her arms, keeping her from being able to escape, and to make things worse, Vanya hadn’t been able to feel the faint buzz of energy her powers typically gave her since she’d entered Hotel Oblivion.
She was practically dragged into the chair, her arms held down by The Murder Magician and The Conductor while another person she didn’t recognize strapped her arms down, then her chest while Dr. Terminal had begun to play with the items on the tray. “You know, Vanya ,” Dr. Terminal cooed, talking to her as if she were an overly emotional child in the midst of a meltdown, “it’s not every day we get quite an exquisite specimen to play with.” Specimen? The fuck?
“What the hell are you talking about?” Vanya asked, then immediately silently berating herself for being such a cliche. As if the ‘villain’ in what she wished was just an imaginary plotline and not her actual life would just spill all their plans after being asked.
As she’d honestly expected, Dr. Terminal didn’t answer the question, nor did anyone else, instead she got a smirk from Dr. Terminal as he stepped closer, Vanya then realized he was holding a gag with a rubber ball strung through it. Vanya tried, as best she could despite the restraints, to pull away from Dr. Terminal but physically was unable to as Dr. Terminal shoved the rubber between her teeth and strapped the band onto her head before dropping her head back onto the chair with a thump.
Rather than monologue his plan for global takeover, choosing not to feed into a cliche villain, Dr. Terminal instead moved to fiddle with the syringe and vial that had been left on the tray. There were murmurs and maniacal laughter around her, but all Vanya could focus on was the needle moving towards the crux of her elbow.
Again Vanya tried to move, and again was stopped by the restraints on her arms and across her chest, but it was a fruitless effort and she couldn’t do anything more than wince as the needle jabbed into her skin, watching the pink liquid slowly was pushed through the needle and into her. She waited for something to happen. Waited. And waited.
And nothing.
Dr. Terminal, The Murder Magician, The Conductor, and seemingly every other villain in the room on the other hand seemed to know exactly what was happening, or what would be happening.
The restraints on her arms and across her chest were undone, the gag pulled from her mouth, and Vanya quickly pushed herself out of the chair, and nearly faceplanted as a result. Just before she did faceplant onto the linoleum flooring, there were hands on her arms again, different than The Murder Magician’s and The Conductor’s from before. “You should be more careful my dear Vanya ,” Dr. Terminal purred into her ear, sending yet another chill down her spine, her heart felt like it was pounding out of her chest, most things were doubled and blurred, and she could barely hold herself up as he continued, “not everyone in here is as pleasant as I am.”
Vanya felt her feet leave the ground as someone, Dr. Terminal possibly, picked her up and then, she was waking up in her hotel room, on her bed, full clothed, alone. With a splitting headache and still slightly doubled vision.
The light that did manage to get through the window was worsening her already pounding headache, causing Vanya to shut her eyes for the slightest second before a familiar voice called “Vanya!”
Her eyes snapped open, flickering around the room despite the brightness of the light, expecting to see someone, only to find herself still alone. Completely, and utterly, alone.
Just as she was about to close her eyes again, seriously thinking about hiding in the bathroom for its lack of windows, a shadow, a figure, appeared at the edge of her vision. And when she looked over at them, expecting them to simply disappear or have never been there at all, she was rather shocked when she looked over and saw, “Five?”