Chapter Text
The numbers were blurring together, then they doubled, then blurred again- Shit, the headache was getting worse.
The quiet sounds of a bug skittering behind him mocked him, as he tried once more to focus on the numbers in front of him.
A sudden jolt of pain spiked from his abdomen and traveled through his whole body, forcing him to double over in his already seated position.
He pressed his palm against the wound and winced when it came away coated in crimson.
He didn’t have time. His medical supplies had run out. He had planned to go look for more today, but then a fucking pebble got in the way of his foot and he tripped onto a conveniently placed piece of rebar.
He was going to die. The thought sounded panicked in his own head. He didn’t have any supplies, he was bleeding out, he was away from his bunker- It’s a library, it shouldn’t be called a bunker. Dolores pointed out one time. Except the memory made his predicament even worse, because he was away from Dolores.
He was going to die out here, and she would wonder why he hasn’t come back yet-
His thoughts came to an abrupt stop when his consciousness threw him back into reality.
The pages of his sister’s book were awfully close to getting ripped out with his frantic turning and checking and then turning again-
He was close to figuring it out. He knew he was. Three years of non-stop calculating and surviving got him this close. But the formula wasn’t perfect, which could lead to disastrous results. He could be sent to the wrong time, his body could be ripped apart by the jump, he could die. The possibilities of it going wrong were endless.
But he didn’t care. It would be one hell of a desperation move, but he wasn’t just going to give up on the world like that. He wasn’t going to give up on his family like that.
If he stayed, he would still die, except this time with the horrible feeling of guilt going up his dry throat.
So, he checked the numbers one more time, trying to clear the haze from his mind.
And he pulled.
It had been two weeks since Five ran away.
At first, she had been the only one of the siblings to worry. Then, after the first seven days, everyone was sneaking anxious and confused glances at each other, seemingly realizing this probably wasn’t one of Five’s usual rebellious acts.
On day eight, a few of them snuck out of the mansion to try to look for their brother. That kind of routine continued for the rest of the week, sometimes with more of them, sometimes less.
That was, until today.
Today was Saturday, just after noon. It was their free time and the children had made an excuse, that they simply wanted to go out. Which they would, except they would be looking for Five in the meantime.
But their mother didn’t allow it. Well, more like Reginald didn’t allow it, but sent her to make it more convincing. After all, none of them really wanted to disobey Grace.
“It’s going to rain soon. I don’t want any of you getting ill from the cold.” Her kind smile was enough to make them comply.
It didn’t stop them from sulking about it though. That’s why they were currently sitting in a circle in Number One’s room.
Vanya doesn’t think she ever got a proper look at his room before. It was huge, compared to hers. There were little models of rockets and planes and a very few posters about space. It was pretty. She couldn’t stop comparing it to her own room. Her room felt so ordinary plain, compared to his.
“I mean, what if someone kidnapped him?” Number Two’s voice tugged her back from her thoughts.
“Diego-“
Klaus’ attempt to calm down his stressed brother got cut off, before it even had the chance to start.
“We wouldn’t even have a fucking clue on where could be!”
Luther shot a look Diego’s way. “Diego, calm down! Panicking isn’t helping anyone.”
Diego was visibly getting more riled up by the second.
“Both of you calm down.” Allison, thinking she could defuse the oncoming argument, spoke up.
If looks could kill, Number One and Three would already be the victims of Number Two’s murderous glare.
Vanya’s eyes drifted over to look at Klaus when she heard a dry chuckle leave his lips. “And we can’t even go out.”
“Hey, dad is leaving for some meeting tomorrow, remember? We can continue looking then.” Ben offered.
“We don’t really know where to look though, Benny boy.”
Diego looked directly at Luther and frantically motioned towards Number Four.
Luther sighed heavily, placing down a map of the city in the middle of them.
“Look, we could start at-“
Out of nowhere, there was a flash through the windows, as a lightning struck, followed by the loud boom of a thunder.
Nothing much about that would be unusual-- if it weren’t for one of Diego’s knives to suddenly shoot right past Vanya’s head and into the wall behind her.
“What the hell, Diego-“ Allison glared at her dumbstruck brother.
“Hey! That wasn’t me-“
A series of more lighting flashes and thunder began echoing through the mansion and lighting up the place at the same time.
Luther got up and ran out of his room, quickly followed by everyone else.
All of them ran through the academy halls (some more clumsily than others), heading for the courtyard, where the sounds and flashes seemed to be most active.
They didn’t know, what to expect, but it sure as hell wasn’t this.
Some sort of blue vortex floated right in the middle of the courtyard. Their father, their mother and Pogo were all already there.
Of course, Number One was the first to speak up. “Dad, what’s going on?”
They all hesitantly approached the trio.
“Stand back, all of you.” Reginald didn’t sound concerned, no, he sounded calm.
Vanya looked at the vortex with strange curiosity. If she tried hard enough, she could see some weird location swirling inside. But staring at it was starting to make her dizzy, so she looked away.
She instead looked around her to try and catch one of her siblings’ expressions, but when she looked back at the blue anomaly, something fell out of it with a painful thud. A second later, the vortex vanished into thin air, leaving a metallic smell of electricity behind.
The something soon turned out to be a someone. The figure was curled up in a fetal position on the ground, their whole body shaking. They were wheezing as if they couldn’t breathe. Vanya couldn’t help but feel sorry for the individual.
She noticed Luther looking up at Reginald for some reason, their father giving him a firm nod in response.
Reginald really seemed way too calm for a situation like this-
“Who are you?”
The sound of the person’s wheezing breaths came to an abrupt stop. Their whole body tensed, stopping the shaking as well. Then all of the sudden, they stumbled up onto their feet, making all of the Umbrella Academy members get into a defensive position.
Now, that the figure was standing, Vanya noticed their incredibly odd appearance. They were basically a bundle of mismatched clothes. A jacket with a bulky vest on top of it, a pilot hat along with the goggles, which were currently covering their eyes and a rag covering the rest of their face, making them completely unrecognizable. There was also something slung over their torso, but Vanya didn’t exactly know what the object was. The strangest thing was, all of their accessories were covered in a layer of grime and dust.
She has been inspecting them for a while now, yet they hadn’t moved an inch from their position. It almost looked like they weren’t even breathing, too busy staring at all of the Hargreeves (At least that’s what Vanya thought. She couldn’t really tell through the person’s goggles.)
“Who are you?” Luther repeated his previous question, this time more forcefully.
That seemed to break their trance. Vanya faintly heard them take a quick shuddered breath as they lowered their head and basically ripped off the goggles from their eyes with shaking hands. Their head shot back up to look at each of her siblings. Her brown eyes met the oddly familiar green ones. The person slowly pulled the rag covering their face to rest around their neck and-
Time seemed to stop.
Because- Because that was her brother. That was-
“Five?” Her own voice sounded so far away.
She couldn’t recognize him before, but now there was no mistaking it, the thick eyebrows, the piercing green eyes, his dimples and- god, he looked like a mess. He looked like he wanted to cry just at the sight of them, but that couldn’t be right, because Five never cried.
Her father’s protest of “Number Seven!” was ignored as she lunged forward to hold her brother in a tight embrace. She heard Five let out a shaky breath and felt his arms be hesitantly placed upon her back.
As if a switch had been flipped, he hugged her back with what could only be described as pure desperation, and just about melted into the embrace.
“Vanya” Her brother sounded choked up, his voice raspy.
Vanya felt like she wanted to cry. And she would have, if she didn't get so surprised by Five suddenly leaning all of his weight on her. (He was too light, she briefly noticed, not easing her growing concern by the slightest.)
“Five?” She lightly tapped his shoulder, “Five!”
Thankfully, one of her siblings seemed to finally come out of their shocked state and ran over to her. “What going on?” Klaus hurriedly asked, already trying to support some of their brother’s weight.
“I-I don’t know! He just collapsed!” she stuttered over her words.
Throughout the whole reunion, Reginald had been quiet. “Get him to the infirmary.”
“Yes, sir.” Grace looked at Luther with a motherly smile. “Luther dear, could you please help me with your brother?”
“Okay, mom.” As Luther moved towards the trio, Vanya carefully adjusted her hold on Five to give his strongest brother a better access. But as she was steadying her unconscious brother, her hand brushed over his abdomen and to her horror, came away smeared with blood.
“Oh g-god! He-He’s bleeding!”
Upon hearing her shriek, Luther hurried his pace and quickly, but carefully pulled Five away from her and Klaus’ grasp. He immediately carried him out of the courtyard, followed by their mother and Reginald, leaving the six individuals to think about the events that have just transpired.
The sky began to cry.