Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Five time traveled. This is the part you know. He time traveled to the post-apocalypse, saw his family’s dead bodies (but no eye), and got stuck.

He wandered for 45 years and was found by The Handler.

And then, some time later, he time traveled again back to 2019, to a quiet and empty backyard.

Five, suddenly in his 13-year-old body, and in a suit too big for him, got up and dusted his knees. He was in the garden of his childhood, and it was empty. Pristine, but empty. The back door was unlocked, and a shiver went up his spine. It wasn’t like dad to leave any door unlocked, even if this one was guarded by a securely locked gate.

The house was as huge as he remembered, but empty. He wasn’t sure what year it was, but the quietness unsettled him. He wanted to yell his sibling’s names, but he stayed quiet. He went up to his room, trying to find some clothes that fit him better.

When he reached the hallway where his siblings grew up, he was startled to find the signs gone. Not just the signs that showed fighting techniques, but any signs of children living there. They were now all guest rooms, uniform and plainly decorated. His and Klaus’s scribblings had been scrubbed and painted over each of their walls, Diego’s knife slashes were dutifully patched. The closets were empty, no boxes with remaining childhood memorabilia.

In fact, there wasn’t memorabilia anywhere. Five vaguely remembered Umbrella Academy merchandise entering the home after their announcement to the public. Action figures and posters and the like, but they were gone too.

He was in the main room, looking at the newspaper to confirm the date and saw the headline, when Grace entered, holding a feather duster.

“Mom…” Five said. Grace took a step back, the kindness leaving her eyes. She dropped the feather duster and spread her feet apart, apparently ready for battle.

“Mom?” Five asked.

“Who are you?” Grace asked slowly.

“It’s me… Five,” he replied. He looked down at himself. “I even look and sound exactly how you remember.”

Grace’s face showed no sign of recognition.

“I’m your son,” Five said again, deadpan. Grace was a robot. Her memory didn’t falter… unless someone tampered with it.

Grace started walking forward, and Five felt anxiety jolt up his spine. He had never seen Grace fight, but he remembered hearing about a couple of bandits that snuck in at night as a small boy. He remembered their screams. Then again, he felt sure he could take her. He was the deadliest assassin in the commission.

“Grace!” Pogo’s voice suddenly entered the room, and Five saw the ape, now somewhat older, looking sternly at his mother. “Please go back to dusting. I will escort the intruder out. He is only a boy.” Pogo came over to him and quite literally escorted him to the front door.

“Pogo, it’s me,” Five said. “What the hell is going on here?”

“I do not know who you are, but if you come back here, you will not receive my kindness again.”

Five shut up. He had a million questions but he knew better by now than to let all of them spill out of his mouth. He would figure out what happened here the old fashioned way. Pogo pushed him out the front door (Five didn’t remember him being so physical) and then slammed the door. Five was now alone in a world that was about to end in 8 days with no friends or allies or anyone. According to the paper, his father was dead. He didn’t know where to start fixing this mess. He supposed he’d start with trying to find his siblings. He also had no idea where to begin with that.

~~~

Five shoved his hands in his pockets and found something he didn’t expect. $100 in smaller bills. Where did he get this? He looked at the years on the money. 2003. 2011. He didn’t get this from the Commission, or in the 1960’s. Pogo. Why did he give Five money? Five cared about the answer to this question, and he cared deeply, but then the faint smell of donuts filled his nostrils, and he decided the mystery could wait a minute.

Griddy’s. It was still here after all this time. He went in and it smelled heavenly. Would the donuts taste as good as he remembered? Would the coffee be any good? He sat down on a stool and ordered a black coffee, then a boston creme donut. He’d kill for a PB & M sandwich right now, but he didn’t know where to get that (or how murdering would help).

The waitress, Agnes, served him his coffee and donut. He took a sip of the coffee (it was okay, better than the Commission’s) and then a bite of a donut.

“Man, this brings me back,” Five said absentmindedly.

“Hm?” Agnes asked.

“I used to come here with my siblings when we were kids. We’d sneak out of the house and eat donuts till we puked.”

Agnes nodded curtly, and gave Five a weird look, then went back to her work.

He ate his coffee and donut, and wondered how he could get a lead on any of his siblings. They’d be 29 now, completely different from the 13-year-olds he left behind. Would any of their interests be the same? Would Diego be in a circus as a knife thrower, or Luther a strongman? Did Vanya pursue the violin? Did Klaus pursue… anything? What about the rest of them?

He took a sip of his coffee, and then a realization slapped him in the face. He was an idiot! His siblings were famous! Even if they were has-beens, people, at least some people, would still remember them.

“Hey!” Five cried.

“Hmm? Agnes said, turning around.

“You know whatever happened to Spaceboy?” Five asked.

“Who?”

“You know, the kid superhero from the turn of the century. What about the Kraken? The Rumor? Where’d they end up?”

“Huh?" Agnes asked again. “What do you mean ‘whatever happened’ to them? They’re comic book characters.”

“No they weren’t-- well they were in comic books, but they were real too.”

Agnes sighed. “A good story can make you feel that way.”

“No,” said Five, growing frustrated. “I mean they were really real. The children of that billionaire Reginald Hargreeves.”

“Oh,” Agnes said. “That inventor who just died? Well I do believe he owned the company that produced those comics. He never had any children though,” she added. “In fact, I distinctly remember there was a whole thing where he said he had a very deep distaste for children. It took at least a year for the papers to forget that one.”

Five rolled his eyes. No one could know how Reg hated kids more than he did. In fact, hatred for his father was all he could really feel at the moment. His mind was simply processing too many things. He was a genius, but a human genius. The brain can only handle so much.

Five took one last gulp of his coffee, then placed some money on the counter.

“Well,” he said, “thank you for the memories.”

“You’re welcome,” Agnes said, somewhat stiffly, clearly still a little confused.

Five got up and left. He wasn’t about to give up on the whole “where are they now shtick” just because some lady didn’t remember them being real. Maybe she has memory issues or something. He tried going to the old comic book store just to see that some chain pharmacy had taken its place. He then noticed the stares he was getting from people, walking around in a too-big suit, so he went into Gimbel’s and got a cheap set of clothes.

But there was another reason to go to Gimbel’s. Dolores. Five held the white button up and black jeans he was about to purchase and he stood in front of her.

“Hello, Dolores,” he said.

Hello, Five. Long time no see.

“I know, I know. I’m sorry.”

Well? Are you going to take me with you this time?

Five looked around at the somewhat busy store. “I don’t think I can, not right now anyways. Maybe later.”

Fine.

Five bought the clothes and a pair of boots and changed into them. It was somewhat formal, but not all the way formal. He discarded his old suit in the dumpster outside and saw a flyer that caught his eye. It was for LGBTQ+ support groups, one for teens and another for adults run every Tuesday/Thursday at the community center. People with questions needed to call Klaus Geist at the provided phone number. Five’s heart skipped a beat. He would never forget Klaus telling him: “I think… I like boys…” during that middle-of-the-night sleepover when they were 12. And if it wasn’t him… well, no harm no foul.

Five went to the closest payphone and dialed the number. It rang several times, and he got antsy.

“Y’ello?” A voice said on the other end.

“Klaus?” Five asked.

“That’s moi.”

“You’re Klaus Ha--Geist?”

“Yes? Who are you?”

“I’m your brother.”

There was a pause.

“My… brother?”

“Yes.”

Another pause. “Well… that’s something. Do you have proof?”

Five’s forearm buzzed. The tattoo. “Yes. Could we meet?”

“Today? Gosh--”

“Please,” Five said forcefully. He never said please, not ever, but he was more desperate than he’d been in years, and that’s saying something. He thought he felt the tone shift over the phone, but maybe he or Klaus just adjusted their phones.

“Well, I suppose I could be at Bittleman’s Deli in half an hour.”

“Perfect.”

Five remembered Bittleman’s Deli. They’d get chicken soup take-out from there when they were sick as kids. It wouldn’t take half an hour to get there, but he said his goodbye’s and walked over.

When Klaus arrived Five knew. He wore eyeliner and mascara and was generally queer and eccentric. Klaus, however, didn’t recognize him immediately.

“Klaus!” Five yelled. Klaus looked over at this child and his eyes squinted in suspicion.

“Are you the person I talked to?” he asked.

“Yeah, it’s Five. Could we go inside?”

Klaus hesitated. “Where’s the proof that we’re brothers?”

Five rolled up his sleeve and showed him the umbrella tattoo. “Dad made all of us get them as kids.”

Both of them instinctively looked down at Klaus’s bare arms. The “HELLO” and “GOODBYE” tattoos were still on his hand, but no umbrella on his arm. Five grabbed his arm and took a closer look. There were no signs of any sort of laser removal.

“Hey, kid!” Klaus cried, pulling his arm back. “What’dya grab me for??”

“It-- it’s nothing…” Five said quietly.

“Well, this has been a fun prank or whatever, but I’m done. Don’t contact me again.”

“Prank? This isn’t a prank?”

Klaus looked at him like he was an idiot. “Well then what the hell was this, kid? It certainly wasn’t very nice.”

“First, my name’s Five and I’m not a kid. Second, it’s not a prank. I am your brother. Well, not biologically, but we were all adopted by Reginald Hargreeves in 1989--”

Klaus burst out laughing. “You’re not even trying! ‘Adopted by Reginald Fucking Hargreeves…’ damn, if you’re gonna make up a backstory at least put some effort in next time.”

“Do you really not remember?” Five cried. “Don’t you remember your childhood at all?”

Klaus’s face fell into a look of deep-seated anger and resentment. “Now that’s just cold.”

“Wait, wait, hold on. You mean… you’re an amnesiac?” Five said slowly.

“Didn’t you know? I mean you knew my name and everything, you must know, right?”

“Know WHAT??” Five nearly yelled, getting upset with how nothing made sense.

“I don’t remember anything before being 17 years old. I just woke up in the homeless shelter on third with my mind nearly blank. The staff just said I stumbled in the night before, not in my right mind.”

Five’s jaw dropped. Reggie wiped their memories, and didn’t even bother to replace them with new ones. That’s why Grace and Pogo didn’t know who he was. That’s why Agnes thought that “Spaceboy” was fake. That’s why Klaus didn’t recognize his voice or who he was in person. Reggie wiped the Umbrella Academy from existence and relegated them to the world of fictional comic books.

Not only was the world going to end in 8 days.

Not only was the world going to end in 8 days and he had no one.

Not only was the world going to end in 8 days and he had no one, the people he thought he had when all hope was lost didn’t remember him one bit.

Chapter Text

Five and Klaus sat across each other in a booth inside Bittleman’s.

“...and now I’m here,” Five said, recounting a brief version of his life story.

“Well,” Klaus said, “That was interesting.”

There was a pause and Five wondered if Klaus would believe him. Klaus was always more willing to believe in the strange and fantastical than his other siblings. Five could see this conversation playing out with his other siblings now: Luther would deadpan refuse, Allison would awkwardly laugh it off as a weird joke, Ben would sigh and leave. Klaus though, Five thought he had a chance with Klaus.

“You still… with the ghosts, right?” Five asked. If Dad could erase their memories, maybe he could erase their powers too. Nothing was impossible right now.

Klaus nodded.

Five was aghast. His version of Klaus bought weed off the man on the corner to keep the ghosts at bay, and Five saw him heading down a darker path. How did this version of Klaus seemingly have his life together? Klaus seemed to register his shock.

“Well, therapy helped,” he said, “and the masters in Psychology. And just plain learning how to deal with them.”

“How?”

“Well… talk to them. When no one’s around, of course. They are, y’know… people. And on occasion, help them to finish their business here.”

Five felt white-hot range course through his body. Why did dad shove him in a mausoleum instead of slowly introducing him to the ghosts? He realized that the wipe might have been kind to Klaus, in some sort of fucked-up unintentional way.

“What about you? What can you do?” Klaus asked.

“I blink. Teleport. Through time and space.”

Klaus’s eyes widened, impressed.

“What do our other siblings do?”

“So you believe me?”

“Well if you ‘blink,’ then maybe.”

“I can’t do it here, it's too public.” Five normally didn’t mind using his powers in front of people, but this was a timeline where superpowers had been erased from public consciousness. The last thing he needed was to be on the radar of the government or anyone here.

“Then let’s go.”

They walked back out of the deli (without ordering anything, which was a little strange, but Five didn’t care), and Klaus took him back to his apartment.

“Aaron should still be at work, so blink anywhere here you want,” Klaus said when they reached the apartment.

“Aaron?”

“My boyfriend.”

“Oh.” Five blinked from the entryway to the couch, and looked at Klaus. He was a little taken aback (given his lack of warning), but he took a deep breath and got over it.

“Well then,” he said. “I guess you are my brother. But what about our other siblings? How have they managed to not be spotted with superpowers?”

“Well, it’d be easy for Allison and Luther.”

“Ok… why?”

Five sighed and explained his other siblings and their powers.

“How has Ben not been caught??” Klaus exclaimed.

“Who knows?” Five shrugged. “Maybe he’s off living in a cabin in the woods. Anyways, do you recognize any of those people?”

Klaus shook his head.

“Fuck.”

Five paced around the small living room trying to think of his next move. He found one of his siblings by sheer luck, but the other five were God-knows-where in a world with nearly 8 billion people.

“Wait,” Klaus said. “Does Diego have two scars on his face by any chance?”

Five froze and looked up at him. Mom was always telling Diego to not play with knives so close to his face. “You know him?”

“Well not really, he’s a cop. He sometimes brings kids to my teen group who he thinks could use some help from someone outside the system. I don’t think I’ve had a real conversation with him, though. He did give me his phone number in case of an emergency, I think.”

Klaus walked to the kitchen and looked at all the numbers tacked to the small cork board in there.

“Aha! Diego Vera,” Klaus said, pulling an old sticky note. He turned to the phone, and then back to five.

“Wait. This is crazy,” Klaus said. “Why am I about to call the police and tell them that I’m his long-lost brother? Can they arrest me for that?”

“Jesus Christ,” Five said. “If you’re not gonna be any help, the least you can do is sit still and not freak out.” He then blinked away. Klaus ran to the hallway, but there was no Five to be found.

~~~

Five was out walking the street to the police station, when he realized he wasn’t sure what goal he had in mind. Collect his siblings → ??? → save the world. That wasn’t much of a plan.

“Only you can defeat the evils of this world!” Reginald’s voice floated through Five’s head. He didn’t trust his old man on a good day, but he figured if anyone could save the world, it was his family. Besides, as much as he wanted to believe it, he couldn’t do it alone.

He entered the police station and found a bustle of 9-5 life. Perps being checked in, a crying woman being interviewed, and policemen hacking away at their desks. At first he went unnoticed, and walked down the aisles of desks looking for a Diego Vera. That was, until, a policeman at his desk looked up and saw him.

“Hey kid, what can I-- hey, wait, it’s you!” The man stood up in shock. “Vera! Patch! The kid turned himself in!” Five looked and saw who he could only assume to be his brother talking with a woman at the water cooler. Their faces turned stern as they came over, and the woman arrested him.

“Hey, wait, what are you doing?” Five said, struggling at first.

“We’re arresting you, you punk kid,” Diego said.

“I didn’t do anything!”

“Tell that to the judge.”

As soon as Five was thrown in a cell and the door locked behind him, he readied himself to escape, but then time slowed and paused and he felt sick in his gut.

“Hello Five,” the Handler said.

“Handler,” he said, refusing to turn around and face her. “You found me quick.”

She laughed. “Of course we did. By the way, good job on the de-aging, I didn’t know you could do that.”

“A fluke.”

“A lucky one, if you ask me.”

“You know I can blink out of here any time right? Why did you arrange this?”

“Smart thinking. You see, the trouble began when your father proved… unhandleable.”

There was a pause, but the Handler did not continue, forcing Five to egg her on.

“You mean…?”

“Well, when he went to erase everyone’s memories of you after your disappearance, we tried to intercept. We lost two good soldiers that way. Who knew he was such a powerhouse, huh?” she said, with a chuckle.

Five was still confused, but he tried not to show it on his face. “So you mean none of this was supposed to happen?”

“It took a lot of re-adjusting to get things back on track once your father took his own path, but we managed it,” she said with a shrug. “Now you’re being a difficult little worm too. I’m afraid I can’t let that happen. Come back to the Commission, Five. I’ll make it worth your while.”

“How?”

“We can restore your siblings' memories.”

Five’s eyes narrowed. He wasn’t sure if he should believe her or not. The Commission had some amazing technology, but if they had the tech to screw with people’s memories why bother with all the torture and murder? Of course, if they did have the ability to “restore” memories, it doesn’t necessarily mean they have the ability to remove or alter them, but the promise was fishy nonetheless. He wanted to ask her to prove it, but then he feared she might just plant a fake memory in someone and reveal it, or worse, do that to himself.

“If you want proof, just come with me,” The Handler said. She held out her hand. Five shied away, and then blinked out of the cell and into the alley. He felt time restart and gasped for breath, then fought the urge to start hyperventilating.

A panic attack isn’t going to help anything, dear.

“I know that, Delores,” Five said to himself.

Why don’t you go find Klaus again? Maybe he can help reason with Diego.

“He couldn’t do that when we were kids.”

Yes… well… he is grown now.

“Neh,” Five said, noncommittally.

Five took a deep breath and started walking around the side of the building.

“He’s just a kid! He didn’t do anything wrong!” He heard a voice argue.

“He stabbed his principal and ran away from his school!”

“It’s a lie!”

“We have the documents to prove it!”

“Well they were faked somehow!!”

Five found Klaus and Diego arguing in front of the police station.

“Hey!” Diego cried, sprinting over to him. Five blinked out of the way, just behind the corner. “What the ffu…” Diego said below his breath. Klaus walked over to him.

“How come you never told me you’re an amnesiac?” Klaus said, dead serious.

Diego turned and looked at him in shock. “How did you--”

“You can also control the trajectory of any object in motion. No wonder you’re such a stellar shot, hm, Vera?”

Diego looked at Klaus with confusion. “Wanna take a coffee break, maybe?”

“My… my shift ends in five.”

“Great, we’ll be waiting.”

“I really should take that kid in.”

“Well sometimes what’s right and what’s Right aren’t the same.”

Diego slid Klaus a glance, and then went back inside the building. Klaus walked over to where Five was standing and leaned against the wall. Five saw his fingers itch. The way Klaus was leaning, the charisma and energy… it was a look that would be completed with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth or between his fingers. But this Klaus didn’t smoke, at least not anymore.

A few minutes later Diego walked out of the station with his jacket, his head low.

“You would not believe the lies I had to spin,” he said.

“Oh well, I’m sure you do it well,” Klaus said joyfully. “This is Five, by the way.”

“Hi,” Five said, holding out his hand. Diego shook it.

“So, you wanna start?” Klaus asked him.

“Now? On the street?”

“Well, you did with me.”

“But… he’s Diego.”

Klaus raised an eyebrow, but despite his lack of understanding he understood anyway.

“Touche. Let’s go back to my place.”

~~~

Diego held his head in his right hand, and his left leg bounced in his chair.

“That’s a lot to process.”

“Yeah,” Five said. “Process it fast. I don’t know when the Commission grunts will be back.”

Klaus looked up from his phone. He managed to keep Aaron away by calling him before he left work and telling him they needed groceries. “Would they come to my apartment?”

“Yeah.”

“Like break in and everything?”

“Yeah.”

“Well I don’t want them to do that.”

“I don’t know what to tell you, brother.”

“So you’re telling me,” Diego said slowly, interrupting, “That the three of us grew up together as brothers with 4 other people? How… how did we not murder each other?”

“Honestly, Diego, I do not know,” Five responded.

“Can we get back to people coming and breaking my apartment and possibly harming my boyfriend?” Klaus interjected.

“How about we focus on finding the rest of us!” Five yelled. “I know dad was an old bastard, but he was obstinate about the fact that only all of us together could save the world, and right now we’re not even halfway there.”

“Well, technically, we are. Right?” Diego said. “Because our second sister doesn’t have powers. She wasn’t in the Umbrella Academy.”

Five narrowed his eyes at Diego. “We’re getting Vanya too.”

There was an awkward silence. “Ok,” Diego said quietly.

“Could we get, like, a hotel or something?” Klaus asked. “Like a big hotel suite for everyone?”

“Knock yourselves out,” Five said. “I’m going to the library.”

“Why?”

“To try and find our siblings.”

“Five. I’m a cop,” Diego said matter-of-factly. Five thought it was the smartest thing he had ever heard Diego say.

Chapter Text

The brothers snuck into the more empty police station that night, as Klaus made hotel arrangements across town. More accurately, Diego walked in the front door and Five blinked into Captain Finch’s office. Diego entered his boss’s office and locked the door behind them. No one on the police force, at least, would disturb them.

Diego then sat down at the desk and logged into his boss’s computer. Five didn’t ask how Diego knew the login. He was still fundamentally the same old Diego, who didn’t like to rely on anyone but himself. Or perhaps his boss was an idiot who trusted him too much. Either way.

“Well, we’re looking for a Luther, Allison, Ben, and Vanya,” Five reminded Diego.

“Any last names?”

“No. Who knows why you remembered your first names, but you both picked new last names, obviously. Of course, the others might’ve picked new first names…” Something then occurred to Five.

“Do you remember when your birthday is?”

“Uh yeah, October first 1989.”

“Did you remember before I told you a few hours ago?”

With a mildly disturbed look, Diego replied: “…yeah?”

“Well that’s a lead. We have first names and date of birth.”

Diego typed all the information they had into the search bar, and none of the results Five saw were Vanya. Luther, Allison, and Ben were equally unhelpful.

“Shit,” Five said, mostly to himself.

“Well, it was a good try,” Diego said with a sigh, but he turned and realized Five had blinked away. Diego logged out and left, and saw Five waiting for him on the street.

“Next time a heads up would be nice.”

“I’m sure it would be.”

They walked back to the apartment and Klaus opened the door with excitement.

“Our sister’s in Russia!” he cried with absolutely no context.

“Wait, hold on, what?” Five asked, entering the place.

“She’s in Russia.”

“Vanya or Allison?”

“Vanya, duh.”

“How did you learn this?”

“Hi,” said a young man sitting on the couch.

“Aaron, I presume?” Five asked.

“Yeah, hi.”

“How much did you tell him?” Five slowly asked, turning to Klaus.

“Y’know just the basics.”

“Klaus. This is sensitive information. You can’t just tell anybody!”

“Aaron isn’t just anybody.”

“Hey Aaron,” Diego interrupted. “So how do you know Vanya’s in Russia?’

“She’s a famous violinist there. She’s traveled all over the world as part of the Russian National Orchestra.” Aaron got up and pulled an old magazine off a shelf, with a picture of a small woman inside holding a violin. Her face was a magnanimous straight line.

“Yeah… that looks like Vanya,” Five said.

“Great. Now we gotta go to Russia?” Klaus asked.

“Well, not all of us. I can’t go since I don’t have any documents, so one of you will have to do it. Do either of you remember Russian?”

Diego and Klaus looked at each other.

“We speak Russian?”

“Dad taught us a bit of every language from where we’re from. Russian for Vanya, Spanish for you, and German for you,” Five said, gesturing to Diego and Klaus. “Not to mention Polish for me, Korean for Ben, and Ancient Greek for Homer.”

“Homer?” Diego asked. “You didn’t mention a Homer.”

“The poet, you dingus.”

“Oh…”

“Is that really a smart idea?” Aaron asked. “Just showing up at some random foreigner’s house and say ‘hi I’m your American brother you don’t remember!’”

There was a pause.

“We could call her. Like you called me,” Klaus suggested. “It’ll be a little expensive but this is kinda important.”

“Well, then we need her number. What’s her last name, while we’re at it?” Five asked Aaron. He took another look at the newspaper.

“Obychnyy.”

“Then we can search for her in the police records tomorrow.”

“There’s no reason for her to show up there,” Diego interjected. “She’s not even American… anymore.”

Five shrugged. “I don’t think Dad sent her there. Why would he have sent her to Russia but not send you guys back to Germany and Mexico? She might have dual citizenship there.”

“How about we go to the motel now?” Klaus said. “No offense but I’d rather not stick around here longer than I have to if there are people after us.”

“I’m gonna go back to my house,” Diego said. “Y’all have fun in your motel room.”

They swapped numbers and parted ways. When the pair got to the motel, Klaus threw the overnight bag he packed at the foot of his bed, took off his high tops and flopped onto the hard, flat bed.

“Night Five,” he said, turning over and pulling the blankets over him. “Wake me up if time travelling assassins arrive.”

Five sat down on his bed and started to unlace his shoes, then re-laced them. He saw a city directory in the front office, and decided to go down there and look and see if Luther, Allison, or Ben were still in town.

Chapter Text

Klaus woke up to see Five sipping coffee and sprawled out among papers and books with the local library’s name stamped on them.

“Hey Five,” he said groggily.

“Morning,” Five responded, taking a sip of coffee.

“Did you even sleep?”

“Do you have work today, or something?”

“I can cancel all my clients. It’s a bit rude, but not preventing the apocalypse is ruder, don’t you think?”

“Great, then can you go to 408 Baker Street? I think Ben lives there. He goes by Ben Gongpo, by the way. Thanks.”

“How did you figure it out?”

Five patted a Koren-to-English dictionary. “I looked for the Bens and followed the pattern.” Klaus also noticed German, Russian, and Spanish-to-English dictionaries laying out.

“Ok… I guess I’ll do that then. What do I say to him?”

“You’re his brother. The same spiel I gave you.”

“I thought he was Korean. Why would he believe I’m his brother?”

“So summon a ghost or something! Or describe the Horror.”

“How can I describe it if I don’t remember what it looks like?”

“It’s a big tentacle eldritch abomination coming out of an interdimensional portal in his stomach.”

“Alright then…”

~~~

Klaus left Five to his nonsense, cancelled his clients, and made his way to 408 Baker Street. When he got there he saw a small stand-alone house on a grass plot that looked rundown as hell. Klaus could imagine doing heroin at a place like this in the old days. He slowly walked up the creaky and rotting steps onto a small porch, with some old garbage and pots and pans littering it. He knocked on the door. No response.

He felt genuinely freaked out. A sort of freaked-out he could only vaguely remember. Enclosing stone walls and people yelling his name.

“Ben!” He called. “I’m looking for a Ben Gongpo?” He asked. He took his keys out of his pocket and put them in his hand, just in case. He pushed on the door and it swung open.

Inside the house wasn’t as bad as he expected. It was a bit of a mess, but it didn’t resemble a hoarder’s house on one of those awful TV shows. A kitchen was just to his right, and Klaus opened the fridge. There was a milk carton in there, among other things. He took out the milk and looked at the date. “Best By: April 2nd 2019” it said. Whoever bought this milk bought it recently.

He ventured further into the house, keeping his footsteps as light as possible. Around a corner he heard a floorboard squeak, and when he turned he saw an Asian man holding a steak knife to his face.

Klaus screamed.

The man screamed.

Klaus screamed again.

“What the FUCK do you want?!” The man asked. His hair was long and he had an unkempt mustache and beard.

“Oh, uh, I’m your long-lost brother,” Klaus said, raising his hands in the air to show he meant no harm. It was only then he realized he basically broke into a stranger’s home. No wonder this man freaked out. “You’re Ben, right?”

The man’s eyes narrowed. “How do you know my name?”

“Well it’s kind of a long story. It’s the same reason I know you’re an amnesiac and have an eldritch--” Klaus fumbled, not wanting to call it an “abomination” or a “horror” “--squid… thing… in your stomach.”

“Are you police? FBI? KGB??” the man asked, holding the knife closer. Klaus took a step back.

“What? No! I’m your brother, Klaus!”

“Sure you are, ‘Klaus.’ Well if you’re not government, how do you know what I am?”

Klaus gave Ben the briefest synopsis ever.

“And then Five sent me over here to get you and now I’m here,” Klaus finished.

Ben lowered the knife and burst out laughing. “You’re crazy! You’re crazier than me! A teleporter, a telekinetic, and a medium are my brothers? It’s insane!”

“You have a squid in your stomach!”

“Ok then, prove it! Summon a ghost!”

Klaus’s stomach dropped. Summoning ghosts was a messy business, and it didn’t always go right. He closed his eyes and clenched his fists, and tried to find the one he could always count on to summon. His fists glowed blue and Klaus searched for the spirit. Just as he started to run out of hope, he felt his old friend appear and opened his eyes to see Enrico glowing blue in the room.

“Enrico!” Klaus cried. “Thank God!”

“Sup, Klaus!” Enrico said. “I haven’t seen you around recently, how you doing?”

“Great, great!” Klaus panted. “Ben, can you see him?”

Enrico and Klaus turned to see Ben, jaw on the floor, looking at the lanky Latino ghost.

“He can see me?” Enrico asked, pointing at Ben.

“Yeah I think so.”

“Damn. You’ve really come along with your powers.”

“Thanks,” Klaus said. He didn’t want to add it was a lot easier when you’re clean.

Ben held his hand out and stepped forward, and his fingers passed through Enrico’s torso.

“Hey man! That’s private,” Enrico said, taking a step back.

Klaus released his fists (he started noticing his fingernails were digging into his palms) and Enrico disappeared from Ben’s view.

“Thanks, buddy,” Klaus said.

“I don’t really understand what happened, but you’re welcome,” Enrico replied, before disappearing.

“Now do you believe me?” Klaus asked Ben.

Ben sputtered. “Now… I mean…”

“Yeah, let’s get you cleaned up and back to the motel.”

~~~

Diego arrived at the motel and knocked on the door, and Five let him in.

“I think I found Ben last night, and Klaus is getting him now.”

“Great.”

“Now we need to get Vanya’s phone number.”

“Great.”

“Could you be of any help with that?”

“I work for the city police, Five. We don’t exactly have contacts in Russia.”

“Well she’s famous, right?”

“All the more reason for her personal info to be secret. Why don’t you just blink to Russia, hm? No need for passports or planes.”

Five looked at him with confusion and contempt. “It doesn’t work like that. Could you swim to Russia?”

Diego was about to respond, but changed topics. “How about the other ones? Any luck with them?”

“Allison and Luther? No. I don’t think they live here anymore.”

“So they could be literally anywhere or anyone?”

“Well, I was thinking of a different approach. How would their powers affect their lives?”

“What are they again?”

“Allison can rumour anyone to do anything. She can say ‘I heard a rumor…’ and then whatever she wants and it becomes true. Luther has super strength.”

“It seems a little strange that someone who can change reality isn’t rich and famous.”

A thought occurred to Five. For someone like Klaus, Ben, or Luther, “discovering” their power wasn’t really an issue. It’d be fairly obvious. But for him, Diego, and Allison… well they’re powers had to be intentionally used. If Five didn’t know he could blink, he’d never do it. It wasn’t the kind of thing most people tried to do on a whim, and even then, it took a lot more than just the “will to teleport” or whatever to do it correctly.

“How did you discover your power?”

“Well… I kinda… just realized… it.”

“What?”

“What I mean is… in the police academy, I learned I could always shoot on target if I just willed the bullet to go where I wanted and moved my fingers a bit. I realized it worked with other things too, like darts or beer pong. But you kinda keep those things to yourself, you know? Because it’s not a normal thing humans do. I just assumed I was lucky.”

“So Allison could be altering reality without realizing it.”

“I thought you said she had to say ‘I heard a rumor’ first.”

“Well that’s the way dad decided to channel her power so that it could be easily controlled and easier for her to use. After the memory wipe, it’s possible her power… freed itself from that trigger phrase. She might just be able to make things come true. Or maybe she’s never used her powers at all and she still needs to use that trigger phrase intentionally. Either way, she probably doesn’t know it exists.”

“And Luther?”

“Well he definitely knows it exists,” Five said, leaving out a rude comment about how this was despite his mental capacity.

“So we should be looking for jobs that require strength. Construction, wrestling, MMA--”

“The circus.”

“The circus? Are there still circuses?”

“That, and anything to do with space.”

“Why space?”

“He was obsessed with it as a kid. Dad sent him to the moon and everything.”

“So… NASA and strongmen jobs?”

Five sighed. “That seems to be our best lead.”

~~~

Klaus managed to convince Ben to shave and brush his hair (and put it in a ponytail) fairly easily. Klaus had a thought that Ben really wanted to do those things and just needed someone else to push him to do it. Getting him to leave the house though, was an entirely different matter.

“Just bring them here.”

“No offense Benny, but this house isn’t exactly… welcoming.”

“You came in anyways.”

“Yeah well, who cares? Come back to the motel. Five and Diego are definitely going to want to meet you.”

“So bring them here.”

“I doubt they’ll come here. They’re stubborn pricks.”

“Well so am I.”

“I don’t understand what’s so difficult about this.”

“I don’t like leaving the house. Is that so weird?”

“Yeah, it kind of is, actually.”

Ben shrugged. “Oh well, guess I’m weird, then.”

“Is there something you don’t wanna see out there? Are you on the run from the law?”

Ben froze.

“The law? Uh oh.”

“What?”

“Err, nothing.”

“What?!”

“It’s nothing!”

“It’s definitely something.”

“Well… Diego’s kind of… a cop.”

Ben’s eyes grew wide. “Oh hell no. There is no way I’m meeting him now. Supposed long-lost brother or not, I am not meeting a cop.”

“If it makes you feel any better he’s got loose-cannon vibes.”

“NO! Why would that make me feel better?!”

“I don’t know! You won’t tell me what your problem is!”

Ben looked like he was about to yell something, but took a deep breath instead. Klaus noticed his hands were holding down the bottom of his shirt.

“Is… is the squid good?”

“Don’t call it ‘the squid.’”

“What should I call it?”

“The Horror.”

Klaus puzzled over why Ben would pick such a name, but decided it wasn’t his business. “Ok. Is the Horror good?”

“That’s not really important.”

“I’m a licensed therapist,” Klaus said. “Given, I specialize in adolescents, but still. You can tell me what the problem is here.”

Ben’s face changed. “And you can’t tell anyone?”

“Well I’m not really your therapist so those rules don’t apply, but--” Klaus looked at Ben’s face, “sure, yeah. I won’t tell anyone.”

“I murdered the previous owner of this house. Luckily it was after he sold it to me.”

Klaus reeled back in shock. He’d had kids tell him things, horrible things, things no child should know about, but he never had anyone confess to murder before.

“Technically it was the Horror. And that old man wasn’t the only one the Horror killed.”

Klaus was also concerned with how causally Ben put it.

“How many people have you--the Horror killed?” he asked in a whisper.

“Four. At least since the amnesia.”

“Well… that clears up some things…” Klaus thought about what it must’ve been like for Ben waking up God-knows-where with no memory and a monster inside him. When Klaus woke up, he was freaked out, already an addict, and with monsters all around him, but he learned quickly that the ghosts couldn’t actually hurt him. For a while he muted them, but after Enrico’s death he got sober and learned how to healthily cope. But Ben… Ben’s monster actually could and did hurt people, and Klaus was growing concerned that Ben couldn’t entirely control it.

“You know… Diego and Five looked up your names in the police records. How come you weren’t there?”

“Well… I was interviewed by the police, obviously, but I threw them off my trail. And you know, when the Horror murders someone it doesn’t look like a human murder.”

“So why are you hiding?”

“Wouldn’t you?”

Klaus had to admit he probably would. He sighed, “Look, Ben. The world is gonna end in 7 days. I told you that, right?”

Ben nodded.

“And Five is insistent that we need the full Umbrella Academy to stop it. Diego isn’t gonna snitch on you.”

“You haven’t even known him for 24 hours. How do you know?”

“I feel it in my gut.”

“That isn’t very reassuring.”

“You believe that we’re your brothers, right? What’s so hard about believing that we won’t betray you?”

“You’re not a monster.”

“I see ghosts everywhere. I’m a former addict. I was in a pretty deep dark pit, a lot darker than this hellhole you’re secluding yourself in. If I was able to climb out of the Mariana Trench, you can climb out of the Grand Canyon. Besides, we’re all gonna be dead in a week if you don’t help.”

“Aren’t you still missing three?”

“Yeah?” Klaus answered, reluctantly.

“Come get me when you get them. I’ll be here.”

“Promise?”

“I don’t leave this house.”

“Great. I’ll come getcha then.”

Chapter Text

Diego went to the city planetarium while Five trekked back to the library, returning some of the dictionaries and borrowing books on memory loss and restoration. Of course, there were a lot of factors missing. Maybe he got Allison to wipe their memories. If so, how come all remains of the Umbrella Academy have been wiped from existence? That must’ve taken a large taskforce, right? Maybe he had some giant mind-wiping satellite in orbit do it. He wasn’t sure if the way a mind was wiped affected how memory retrieval worked, but he looked into it anyways.

Of course, Reg did teach them a little psychology back in the day. Five vaguely remembered learning that retrograde amnesia (the kind where a person loses all memory before an event, in this case, Reg wiping their mind) is pretty much impossible to cure, and the memories that are lost never come back. It had been about 18 years on Earth since that lesson though, so Five was just a tiny smidge hopeful that something magical had come along to change that.

A brief dip into a psychology textbook saw Five’s minuscule hope crushed. Retrograde amnesia was still incurable. But a sliver of that hope remained. His sibling’s memories didn’t go due to trauma or a rock to the head, it was caused by something supernatural or otherworldly and purposeful. There’d be a sliver of hope yet.

~~~

Diego didn’t recall ever stepping foot inside the planetarium before. Now that he knew his past he thought it was likely that Reginald took them here as children, but he still didn’t recall it. He walked to the front desk, flashed his police badge, and asked the middle-aged woman working there if there was a Luther on staff.

“On staff?” She asked, “no. Although I understand why you would think that. Is he in trouble or something?”

“No, he’s just privy to information on… a case. Why would I think he works here, though?” Diego asked, leaning on the desk.

“Well he comes here whenever he’s in town. We are talking about Luther de Luna, right?”

Diego nearly facepalmed himself over that last name. Five wasn’t kidding about the moon obsession. “He--? nevermind.” He would laugh about Luther’s chosen last name later. “Big strong blonde guy, right?” He asked, recalling Five’s description.

“Yes, quite unmistakably.” the lady said with a nod.

“Do you know where I could find him?”

“I believe he’s due back in town soon.”

“What does he do? Where is he now?”

“Oh, I couldn’t tell you where he is, exactly. He’s with the Zizzer-Zazz Brothers Circus. They go all over the country.”

“The circus? Really? Huh.”

“Yes, he’s a strongman there. Quite impressive if you ask me.”

Diego nodded, and gave the motel room number and his apartment phone’s number to the lady. “If he shows up, call me.”

The lady nodded and took a note.

~~~

Diego and Klaus arrived at the motel at the same time.

“Where’s Ben?”

“He’s staying at his house.”

“Why?” Diego asked, as he opened the door and walked in.

“Personal biz.”

“Does he not like leaving his house? That’s a little weird.”

“Yeah, well all of this has been a little weird,” Klaus said, flopping down onto one of the beds. “I mean we just straight-up believed a 13-year-old is a 58-year-old time traveling assassin.”

“In his defense he can teleport.”

There was an awkward silence. Neither was willing to admit the other was familiar in a weird way, like an old forgotten childhood TV show.

“Do you believe him?” Diego asked, leaning on the TV stand/cabinet. “Do you really think the world is gonna end in 7 days?”

“I dunno. I’ve thought the world was gonna end like, a million times. A bad trip will do that to ya…”

“Coz if it is… there’s some personal shit I should probably figure out.”

“Like what?” Klaus asked, sitting up.

“Personal shit.”

“Ah.” There was another pause. “Y’know I didn’t tell Aaron about the world ending.”

“You didn’t?”

“I didn’t wanna freak him out. I mean, Five really seems to think we can stop it, but how? He hasn’t shared any sort of plan with me.”

“Me neither.”

“He seems to think that if he can magically gather us all together, the world is saved!”

“Well, in good news, Luther is probably coming to town. Apparently he works for a traveling circus. I guess he lives here during breaks.”

“Good for him. I guess all that’s left is the girls, then.”

Diego told Klaus about Five’s theories on Allison.

“Shit…” was Klaus’s response.

“Shit indeed.”

“You think she can restore our memories?” he asked. Diego’s face changed in a way that made it look like a light of understanding turned on over him.

“Oh my God… if she really is that powerful…”

“…pretty much any problem is solved.”

“Is she though? I mean, that would make her more powerful than the rest of us combined.”

“What are you asking me for? Five is the only one who knows her.”

“I dunno. You talk to dead people. Maybe they know something.”

“I’ve never met a super-powered dead person. At least not that I know of.”

~~~

Five was walking home from the library empty-handed, with his hands in his pockets. He stared at the concrete of the sidewalk as he walked, emanating such an intimidating aura he didn’t have to bother watching out for other pedestrians (he did, in the middle of his walk, remember to look up for cars though; not something one must do in the apocalypse).

He was out of strings to follow, paths, or footnotes. He had no way of contacting Vanya, no way of even finding Allison, and at this point he didn’t know the news on Luther. Seven days, and they were ticking by fast, and he had barely half the Academy.

He would have to go back to the mansion.

Something about Pogo’s behavior didn’t sit right with him. When it happened he was just confused and jostled enough to let it slide (and he’d been so busy in the 24 hours since), but now that he knew more about this strange new world and had a moment to think, something didn’t sit right. Why give him the money if he thought he was a trespassing no-good teen? Why stop Grace? Pogo knew something, Five felt it in his gut. Even as a child he was aware that Pogo was privy to things that he wasn’t. He was his father’s right-hand man, and as such, got the scoop on details that children didn’t.

Even if Five was wrong, the Hargreeves mansion was the only place he could think of with clues. Reginald had to be behind the amnesia. Reginald was behind everything, like some big puppetmaster. Five also recalled all the monitoring that was done on them as children. Why wipe their memories and leave them in the cold? He thought it was odd enough that three of them were still in the city, but why send Vanya back to Russia? Maybe Reggie didn’t send her there, but if he did… what was the purpose in sending her away? Was he really that embarrassed that she was normal?

Five considered how he wanted the break-in of the mansion to go. Klaus was nothing but a liability. His power had always been, well, quite useless in the field. And now he didn’t even remember any of his training. Klaus would have to stay behind. Diego though? Diego’s power could come in handy, and he had police training. But what if he got caught? He can’t blink out of sight like Five could, and a policeman getting caught breaking into the mansion of a recently deceased billionaire would cause a scandal.

Five had to go alone.

~~~

When Five got back to the motel room the three exchanged reports. Five mulled over them are presumed it could be worse. Ben would come when the others were here, and Luther was probably within reach soon. All that’s left is the girls.

“Well. One of you is going to Russia,” Five said.

“It can’t be me,” Diego responded immediately. “I’ve thought it over, and it’d be too suspicious. Letting you go one day and then taking off the next, and then going to Russia? I don’t need to be investigated.”

“Well Klaus, looks like you’re going to Russia.”

“I don’t have the money to go to Russia! Why can’t you blink there?”

“We’ve been over this, you can’t swim to Russia!!”

Klaus gave Five a confused look, and Diego looked at him as if to say “don’t worry about it.”

“Look, I can lend you some money,” Diego said.

“And going into debt doesn’t matter if the world ends!” Five said, loudly making an exit.

“Didn’t he just get here?” Klaus asked.

~~~

Five first went to Gimbels’ and purchased a black hoodie, and then went back to Griddy’s to wait out the rest of the day. He could only sneak into the mansion under cover of darkness, when hopefully both Grace and Pogo would be asleep (he didn’t want to interrogate Pogo unless absolutely necessary). He’d disable the security system, then break into Reggie’s office and dig for anything he could find. Of course, he wasn’t entirely sure how to disable the security system. As a child, he knew where all the blind spots were on the security cameras, and he even remembered some of them, but disabling the cameras was never even a possibility. The punishment would’ve been horrific.

Agnes gave him a refill on his coffee.

“Long day?” she asked.

“Tell me about it.”

She sighed. “Each day feels so long, but then you blink and a month’s gone by and you wonder where the time went.”

“I remember when I was a kid the days used to pass so slowly. Then everything started speeding up and up and now I’m constantly short for time.”

She gave him a weird side glance, and then a professional laugh. “They give us all the time we need as adults when we’re kids, huh?”

“Truer words have never been spoken.” Five took a long sip from his cup, placed down the money he owed (which was almost the last of it), and walked out. It was just past 9, Griddy’s had to close soon, and Five had to go scope out the mansion.

He didn’t entirely remember Pogo and Grace’s bedtimes, so he wasn’t sure when they’d be asleep, so he didn’t want to break in immediately and get caught by one of them. He walked around the block as casually as possible and noted the security cameras, and figured out exactly where to blink into the house so as to not be caught disappearing on camera. As soon as he blinked in he lifted the hood over his head and slipped into the monitoring room. Five had found it by accident as a child during a game of hide and seek on one of their precious Saturday afternoons, and had kept it to himself ever since.

Luckily, all the equipment was old, and all Five had to do was switch it off and unplug any plugs he found. The screens fizzled and went black, and he exited the room cautiously, still keeping his hood up. For all he knew, that was a fake security room, and dad kept the real one in a secret room in the basement with all sorts of high-tech gadgets and passcodes and locks.

Five managed to not get too lost on the way to Reggie’s office. He thought about locking the door, but decided against it. Pogo would have a key, and the office was on the second floor, and he didn’t want to risk falling to the ground in case of an emergency magical self-defenestration unless absolutely necessary.

He started with the desk, which was surprisingly messy. Five always thought of his father as being so organized, but the desk looked like it had been ransacked. Maybe his mind was starting to go as he reached the end.

Five did find a lot of interesting things in those documents. Assassinations and assassination attempts (not limited to: Archduke Ferdinand, the 4 assassinated American presidents, Reagan, and MLK). He read about “hanging chads” in Florida at the turn of the century (something he vaguely remembered but was too young to understand at the time), and secret deals with the Russian and Italian mafias. But nothing on his siblings. It wasn't until he opened a pearl-encrusted box and found a thin red leather book with “RH” inscribed in gold on the cover that he found the motherload.

Chapter Text

Five’s blood curdled as he read the journal that showed all of Reggie’s research on them as children. The invasion of privacy, the lack of concern for their wellbeing, “no great loss,” and so much more drove into him like pin-pointed daggers. But what was the most surprising (though not the most hurtful) was one simple concept. Vanya had powers. And powerful, destructive ones at that. Five understood now why he sent Vanya to Russia (assuming he did). He was afraid of her. She was presumably no longer on the sedatives he had her on when she was a child. She was roaming free and able to cause as much destruction as she pleased.

And yet she was first chair violinist in the Russian National Orchestra.

Five tried to imagine someone with that much power, and the temperament described by Reginald here, leading a normal life. Five only knew the Vanya on drugs, not the Vanya described here. Of course, Vanya is now 29, not 4, and changes to personality in those intervening years are inevitable.

Besides, the drugs she was on wouldn’t change her personality that much, right? He wasn’t sure. Even when he looked out at sprawling pages explaining the drug Reginald decided to put her on, he frustratingly found a lot of the chemistry beyond him. They hadn’t really gotten to medical chemistry by the time he ran away, and though his years in the apocalypse were helpful in practical ways, stuff like this wasn’t taught by the school of life. He skimmed until he found the pages on his erasure.

The fallout after his disappearance had been huge. The media let a shitstorm loose on Reginald, and he decided it would be easier to make the whole thing go away. He launched a satellite into space (so it was a satellite) in order to zap the whole world at once with some alpha waves and ionized M. globules?? (again, some of it was beyond even Five) in order to erase their real memories of Five and make them believe Five was a fictional character, and never a part of the real life Umbrella Academy. He said that between the satellite and a “team of agents” conscripted by “a friend,” the mission was a success. He used a more concentrated beam in his own house on the siblings, and manually erased and altered Grace’s memories. There was no mention of Pogo at all. There was a mention of the commission, two agents named Hazel and Cha Cha who were “swiftly dealt with.”

Five gulped. He had heard of Hazel and Cha Cha. They were legendary around the Commission, and Reginald had apparently killed them easily.

Unfortunately, this journal stopped on May 31st, 2006, when his siblings were still 16. He remembered Klaus saying that he was 17 when he woke up after losing his memories, so Five didn’t have any details on that.

He put the journal back in the box and looked for a second one. There was no reason for Reg to stop his journaling on that date (as far as Five knew), so there had to be a second one.

He heard steps outside. He ducked behind the desk and breathed as lowly and slowly as possible. The door creaked open, and Five couldn’t see who came in. He was trapped. If he did blink, he’d make a glowing portal and noise, and if Pogo did remember the truth, then he would know Five was here. And if he didn’t… well he sure would suspect something.

Five peaked his head out the slightest bit, and Pogo saw him.

“Shit--”

“Master F-- I mean, you!!!”

“Wait, what did you just call me?” Five asked, holding back a laugh as he stood up.

“You’re the rapscallion who broke in here yesterday!”

“You were about to call me Master Five, weren’t you? You remember me, Pogo. Dad didn’t erase your memory.”

Pogo’s face was still rife with alarm for another second, and then he dropped it and sighed.

Five continued: “I don’t want to hurt you, Pogo, or mom. I think it would be much more productive to do a voluntary exchange of information.”

“Your father trusted me with his most closely guarded secrets. I refuse to betray that trust.”

“Okay, I’ll start. First, I’m a lot older than I was when I left, the reason I look like this is because I screwed up my jump. Second, I know about Vanya’s powers.”

“You’re… what?”

“I time traveled to the future and got stuck there for 45 years. In the post-apocalypse, which I think dad had some part in. When I came back my body reverted to a version of itself present across each point of the space time continuum.”

“Oh.”

“Your turn.”

Pogo sighed and shook his head.

“No? What do you mean no?” Five asked forcefully. “You know the world ends in seven days, right? Nearly six? You’re just okay with dying in six days? You’re just okay with everyone else dying? Mom, me, Klaus, Diego, Luther, Allison, Vanya, and Ben? You’re okay with everyone and everything you’ve ever cared about being destroyed?”

“I’ve lived a long life, Five. A lot longer than I would’ve without your father’s intervention.”

“Yeah, but my siblings haven’t.”

Pogo’s face changed in a way that made it clear he noted Five’s exclusion of himself from that statement. 58 years wasn’t quite old, and they both knew it, but it was less of a tragedy to die at 58 than it is at 29. But he didn’t say anything.

“I can’t believe this. I can’t believe you. You’re better than this,” Five said, looking the second father figure in his life right in the eye. “You’re better than him, and you’re better than being okay with all of us dying.”

Pogo looked away, probably in shame. Five smiled inwardly at that small victory. A lot of Reginald might’ve rubbed off on Pogo, but he could never be as selfish and coldhearted as his old man.

“Fine, Master Five. I suppose his secrets can’t hurt him any longer. What do you wish to know?”

“Well first, I want to know where Allison is, and second, I want money to send Klaus to Russia.”

“Ah, so you’ve found Vanya.”

“I’ve found all of them except Allison… and you know what? I wanna know exactly where Luther is too. For safety’s sake.”

Pogo opened a locked cabinet with a key and pulled out two hefty files, one labeled “00.01” and another labeled “00.03.” They were all adults and Reginald still refused to use their names. Five felt more anger burning inside him, but he knew better than to release it on Pogo.

Pogo opened Luther’s file towards the back and flipped through some pages.

“Ah. When Luther is in town, he stays at his friend’s apartment. The address is 2401 South Maple Street, suite 511.”

“And his friend’s name is…?”

“Henry Mellcot.”

“Thank you. And Allison?”

~~~

Klaus had returned to the empty motel room after dinner and a quick goodbye to Aaron, and found he couldn’t fall asleep. He remembered how this morning he found Five already wide-awake and burning through coffee, and made a pact with himself to not fall asleep until he was back. Klaus knew that Five was a grown man, but when he looked at him, he just saw an incredibly stressed out and grumpy 13-year-old. He was in danger alone at night, even if he could just blink away.

Klaus turned on the TV and flipped through the channels until he found one of those infinitely repeatable cooking shows Aaron liked to watch sometimes after work. Klaus had neither fondness nor hostility towards them, so he shrugged and left it on. There are worse things.

Hours passed and Klaus finished the cooking show, and turned the channel to a late-night comedy-news show. Again, figuring there are worse things, left it on, and gave himself a quick slap on the cheek to stay awake. He itched for a cigarette, or even something stronger to help keep his focus. It wasn’t that late, but my God was it boring.

Snuggled up under the blankets, he was about to doze off when he heard:

“Hi, I’m Allison Fama,” a woman said over soft, jangly music. “Having trouble losing those last 10 pounds? Are you and your partner going through a too-long rough patch? Is there something that you’ve wanted to accomplish for years but haven’t? Well then I’m the person to talk to. One half-hour session of hypno-analytical therapy with me, and you’ll be well on your way towards your goals. Just call 1-800-997-0180 to talk to a consultant or schedule an appointment today. In fact, I heard a rumor you are going to now.”

Allison smiled and the tv cut to the next commercial. Klaus had a powerful urge to call that number and make an appointment, and even reached towards the phone before slapping his right hand with his left, and then slapping his face again.

The phrase “I heard a rumor” jangled around his head. He’d heard that before, recently.

Diego. Diego told him that Five told him that Allison said the phrase “I heard a rumor” to start her power. Five said that Allison’s powers were impossible to stop too, and nobody had resisted them. He wondered, how, then, could he have not called the number? Perhaps the fact that it was a recording on TV diluted her powers somehow, and that if he were here in person, he would’ve dialed 30 seconds ago.

Klaus felt an anxiety knot begin to grow in his gut. There was something so… disgusting… about his sister being a TV con artist. Something about her whole commercial reminded him of televangelists and famous psychics and mediums (he thought, with a hint of irony, he could also be using his power to become a world-famous medium/psychic, and not be a scam, but the thought of it still made him a little ill). Not to mention the whole “hypno-analytical therapy” thing. Klaus knew for a fact there was no such thing, and pretending there was is inherently scummy.

On the other hand, Klaus didn’t doubt she was helping them. If she told a client that she “heard a rumor you lost ten pounds” they would lose ten pounds. Of course, the ad didn’t list the price of her sessions, so it’s possible that she’s charging people thousands of dollars just for that. Then again… it is actual, literal magic… but… Klaus decided to stop thinking about the ethics of it. He had to tell Five, but he didn’t know where Five was. The kid was growing on Klaus, but his habit of disappearing without warning was frustrating.

~~~

Five read the file. “She’s a TV psychic healer person?” he asked, incredulously. He could never have seen that path for Allison. Then again, she did fantasize about being a Hollywood moviestar as a kid, and you need to have a sort of moral ambiguity to pursue that, so perhaps not-so-scammy-scam-artist was something plausible. Besides, if you woke up with no memories and a magic power with 10 million uses, wouldn’t you try to make it your career? Come to think of it, Five was a little surprised Klaus hadn’t once he got clean.

Five wondered how Allison discovered said power, but didn’t bother wasting time asking Pogo. He got her home address (which happened to be a huge mansion outside of the city), office address, and personal and work phone numbers, and was ready to be off and say goodbye to Pogo, before something occurred to him.

“I think Allison and Luther will be the hardest to convince,” he said to Pogo. “Can I take the journal with me?”

“No,” Pogo said, almost taken aback. “Do you know what would happen if that got into the world? Master Hargreeves was very careful in making sure every bit of evidence of you kids as real people was scrapped from the world. This getting loose would ruin everything!”

“You’re worried about everything being ruined for a dead man?”

“Well the estate, the businesses, the shareholders, the charities--”

“What about us, Pogo?! What about those six souls whose lives got ripped from them as you stood by and did nothing!”

Pogo looked at him in silence, jaw slightly dropped. He then took a big deep breath in, and steadied his resolve.

“Master Five… I won’t pretend I’ve lived a moral life. But your father saved me when I could’ve died as a child, and gave me the ability to live life like a human. He’s the reason I am here today and able to converse with you. He’s the reason I got to see all you children grow up and do the best I could to help you. I am very sorry, but I cannot give you his journal. You’ll have to convince Master Luther and Miss Allison of your plight yourself.”

Five’s eyes narrowed at the old ape, and he wanted to continue arguing, but realized Pogo could still be helpful. “Fine. But tell me, is there anything you can do to stop the apocalypse?”

Pogo stared off into the distance, forlornly, for a moment. Then he said:

“I will give you all the funds you need to get Vanya, and anything else you require.”

Five nodded curtly. “I’ll come back for that tomorrow. And I’ll bring Klaus and Diego, if they want to come.”

Pogo opened his mouth to object, then closed it again, and nodded back.

“Goodnight, Pogo.”

“Goodnight, Master Five.”

And Five blinked off into the night.

~~~

When Klaus heard the door handle turn, he jumped out of his bed to meet Five.

“I found Allison!” he cried.

Five raised an eyebrow. “You did?”

Klaus explained.

“Great. Well, I found her too. I’ve got her address and phone number for her home and office. We can get her tomorrow morning.”

“Really? How.”

“I had one last resource to exploit, and it turned out to be very helpful. We’re also getting you on a plane to Russia tomorrow, and don’t worry about the funds. I’ve got that too.”

“Five, you’re being very confusing right now.”

Five looked up at the young man, and saw worry in his eyes. A kind of worry that said “I’m not sure you’re right in the head.” Dolores had given it to him many times.

“I’m fine,” he asserted. “I’m perfectly fine.”

“Okay…” Klaus said, choosing not to push it further. “Let’s just go to sleep, alright?”

They washed up and went to bed, and Klaus tried to force himself to stay awake until he heard Five’s breathing slow into the rhythm of sleep. He didn’t make it.

Chapter Text

Five was up and pacing around the room muttering to himself when Klaus woke up.

“Morning…” Klaus said again.

“Morning,” Five responded politely. “Today is a very busy day, so we need to move fast. Get dressed and I’ll tell you today’s schedule. First, you’re going to pack to go to Russia, then we’re going to the Hargreeves’s mansion and you’re going to get a big fat check for plane tickets and hotels, and then you’re going to fly to Sheremetyevo International Airport and find Vanya. Arg! I didn’t get Vanya’s address last night. We’re going to ask for that too. And then me and Diego are gonna take a drive to Allison’s mansion and go get her.”

Klaus blinked at him. “Five, you’re gonna have to repeat that once I’m actually awake.”

“What are you still sitting around for, get dressed!”

“Geez, alright.”

Klaus got up and changed his clothes, and then the two of them checked out of the hotel and walked back to his apartment to properly pack for Russia.

“Funny how no one’s come for us yet,” Klaus said.

“What do you mean?”

“The people? You said people were coming to attack us, and they haven’t, and it’s been almost 48 hours.”

“I don’t know what to tell you. And I thought you didn’t want people attacking you and your boyfriend anyways.”

“Well obviously not, it’s just… interesting. What if they’re waiting for me in Russia?”

“I dunno, summon some Russian ghosts! Use Vanya’s powers!”

“Wait, I thought you said she didn’t have powers.”

“Well she does.”

“What are they?”

“It’s kinda vague. Sound powers.”

“What… what the hell are sound powers?”

“She can amplify sounds and the vibrations will cause things to happen. She also seems to have weather control and flight.”

“Damn, that’s a lot.”

“Yeah, apparently dad was sedating her our whole childhoods. I still don’t know for sure if he sent her to Russia or not… another thing to ask Pogo… but I think he did it out of fear. He didn’t send anyone else away. Allison just lives one county over on her mega estate, and I’m not sure Luther has a permanent address. That’s why only you, Diego, and Ben were in the city directory.”

“Oh.”

At Klaus’s apartment he packed while Aaron tried to make small talk with Five and appease him with coffee.

“So, how’s your day been?” Aaron asked Five as he brewed his finest Colombian coffee.

“Oh today? Today hasn’t been horrible yet.”

“Well, that’s nice.”

There was an awkward pause.

“So… Klaus is going to Russia?”

“Yep. To find our sister.”

“Well that’s nice. It’s great that Klaus is finding his family.”

Five leaned forward. “How much did he tell you, exactly?”

“Well… he told me that you guys are his siblings, and that there’s six of them in total. He told me you all have powers, like him.”

“He told you about his powers?”

“Yeah, like 6 months ago.”

“Oh… okay.”

“Did he tell you anything else?”

“That you were all adopted.”

Five nodded. “And that’s it?” His mind immediately wondered if Aaron thought he was still 13.

Aaron nodded, and turned back to the coffee machine. His brother wasn’t dating a dumbass. Aaron could tell there was a lot he didn’t know. Five felt a bit bad for keeping this nice young man in the dark, but he thought it was for the best. No matter how much he disliked it, he had to agree that Pogo had a point about this information getting out into the world. Not only would it disrupt society, it would completely uproot his sibling’s lives. It might be better for the world, at least, to live in blissful ignorance. That is, if his siblings can save it.

“So uh, how did your sister end up in Russia?”

“Not sure. I’ve been out of the picture for a while.”

“Huh.”

The awkward silence was somewhat lessened by Aaron pouring Five his coffee into a mug. Five took it and took a sip, and smiled involuntarily.

“That’s very nice.”

“Thank you.”

Five took another sip and set the mug down, and then Klaus came into the kitchen with a rolly suitcase.

“I’m gonna have to cancel my meetings at the community center,” he said. “I can’t believe I forgot. I also wanna see if I can get a replacement for Thursday--”

“No time for that. We gotta go now.”

“Five, I gotta cancel the meetings. I feel bad enough about doing it, but I’m not going to leave the members wondering what happened to me.”

Five closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Fine. Let’s go. Expeditiously.”

~~~

The community center was out of the way, but the duo made haste (except when a cop car rolled by and they slowed their walking and Five looked at the ground, hoping the cop wouldn’t recognize him) and got there quickly. Five hung back as Klaus talked to the woman behind the desk, and then realized he had to go to the bathroom, so he followed the bathroom signs and went into the empty, sanatized place.

His guts rumbled a bit, and he felt slightly unnerved. He was alone right now, and for some reason feared that any second the Handler or a goon would pop out from behind one of the stalls.

Klaus was right. They had left him alone too long. The Handler should’ve sent people by now to stop him. Why hadn’t they?

He used the bathroom quickly and went back out to the lobby where Klaus was on the phone.

“This is a little more important than our jobs, Diego. Just meet us at the mansion.”

“What are you doing?”

“Calling Diego. He went into work today. You said you needed him so I’m trying to get him to come down here.”

“Gimme the phone.”

Klaus handed it over.

“Diego, I need you and your car to get to Allison’s house. You gotta leave work early.”

“I’m not sure I can do that, everyone’s kinda pissed at me right now, for obvious reasons.”

“Well I’m sure everyone’s ghost will be a lot more pissed off at you if they find out you could’ve stopped the apocalypse,” Five hissed.

There was a tense pause. “Look… I’ll see what I can do, but you can’t just drop everything when you have a government job. There are rules.”

“Diego. I know that. Commission, remember? People still managed to get time off if they really needed it!”

“I said I’ll see what I can do already. Just go get the money and get Klaus’s ass to Russia already. Bye.”

“Bye.”

Five hung up the phone and the two took a bus to the mansion.

“It’s gonna be so weird going in there,” Klaus said.

“Why?”

“Why?? Because it was the mansion of a mysterious billionaire, duh! Sir Reginald Hargreeves was just like… this looming figure over life…” Klaus seemed to want to go on, but he didn’t. Five looked down and thought about it from his perspective. How did he not think about how weird this would be? To him, Reginald was just an old asshole who fucked him and his siblings up. But to them? He’s elusive. Wealthy beyond their wildest dreams. A Presence.

“Huh… I never thought about it that way.”

Klaus nodded.

At the mansion they knocked on the front door and Pogo let them in.

“Good morning Master Five, and Master Klaus, I presume.”

“Hi… Master Pogo,” Klaus said awkwardly, holding out his hand.

“Just Pogo is fine,” Pogo said, taking it.

“Ok… just Klaus is fine too.”

Pogo made no sort of acknowledgement.

“I’ve made good use of my morning, Master Five,” he said. “I booked you the penthouse suite at the Royal Inn for the next six nights and bought plane tickets for Master Klaus to Sheremetyevo International Airport in Russia. The flight is at 4pm. I’ve also set up a bank account with $50,000 and a debit card for you and a credit card for Master Klaus at American Savings and Loan.” Pogo pulled the cards out of his jacket pocket and handed them to Five and Klaus.

“Thank you,” Five said.

“Thanks,” Klaus said.

“I also wrote down directions from here to Miss Allison’s office, and Miss Vanya’s address and phone number.”

“Thank you again,” Five said, taking the directions and address.

“My flight is at 4pm? So I could probably go with you to Allison’s,” Klaus interjected.

“Yes you can. Pogo, may we borrow the car?”

The old ape sighed. “Yes, I suppose you can…”

The pair left Pogo and started walking towards the garage.

“It was pretty weird how he called us ‘Master,’ right?”

“Dad wanted him to do it. He called us ‘Miss’ or ‘Master’ our whole childhoods.”

“Seems very… of a bygone era to me…”

“Yeah maybe, but if he wants to keep doing it while giving us all these favors, who am I to stop him?” Five said with a shrug.

Klaus shut up about it. It still made him a bit uncomfortable, but he thought pushing it further would make other people uncomfortable. Then another thought occurred to him, something he thought he could push.

“Could I like… look around, for a few minutes, you think?”

Five turned around. “I know your flight isn’t for 7 hours, but we don’t have time to laze about.”

Klaus furrowed his brow. “I’m not asking for that much, I don’t think. I grew up here… apparently. I think I have a right to see my childhood home.”

Five knew Klaus didn’t get aggravated over much. Two things at a time was a lot, and he though he knew he’d get nowhere asking Pogo to stop calling Klaus “master” (even though he agreed, it was a bit weird), but he did have control over letting Klaus see the mansion.

Five sighed.

“Fine. I guess. I’ll give you the brief tour.”

Five ushered him through the first floor, which looked basically how he remembered, then up to the bedrooms. The rest of the mansion would have to wait. Five told him which room belonged to everyone, and then Klaus went into his own room.

He stepped in slowly, as if he was worried the floors were burning hot and would scald his feet. He looked all around the plain room, the room that looked nothing like Klaus. He went to the corner where his bed once was, and touched the wall where all his irreverent and often grotesque drawings used to be. He stood there for a moment in silence, and Five couldn’t help but wonder what was going through his head. He wondered what drew Klaus to that particular part of the room. Klaus then lowered his hand and looked around the rest of the room, and then into the closet. He went down to the ground and chuckled.

“What?”

“Sir Hargreeves missed something when he was clearing out my room.” Klaus pointed to something near the floor of the closet. Five came over and crouched down.

There was a small etching on the inside of the wall: “nolite te bastardes carborundorum.”

Five smiled slightly. Something about Klaus repeating the actions of Offred was so entirely him. His smile faltered. Klaus wasn’t violated the same way Offred was, but Five knew that he was violated nonetheless. “He made us read The Handmaid’s Tale. He made us read a lot of things.”

“He does seem like the kind of guy to make us read things.”

Five couldn’t help but let out a tiny chuckle.

The two then walked down to the car, and Five was about to get in the driver’s seat, but Klaus managed to convince him otherwise.

“Do you even have a license?”

“Yes, I do. I just don’t have a car.”

“When’s the last time you drove?”

“Um… I’m not sure…”

Five sighed. “Well at least if we get pulled over you have a license.”

Chapter Text

The drive to Allison’s office went okay. Not with no hitches (there was a missed exit and a few loops around streets and they did get a bit lost) but all and all it could’ve been worse. They rolled up to Ventus Incorporated and managed to find parking after 7 minutes in busy downtown on a Tuesday.

When they got out of the car Klaus realized they didn’t exactly have a plan.

“What are we gonna do? Go in there and demand a meeting with her?”

“I can blink anywhere, remember? I’ll get to her.”

“What about me?”

Five paused. This was stupid. He should’ve come alone.

“Well, you can try to get in the old fashioned way. Maybe try to get a consultation or something. I dunno.”

“What problem should I say I have?”

“Literally any normal problem.”

And with that, Five blinked away.

Five appeared in an alleyway and then blinked inside, finding himself in an abandoned hallway. He found a service elevator that was thankfully unlocked and took it to the top floor. If he knew his sister, she’d have a big office on the top floor.

Outside the elevator he started walking down the hallways looking for signs. The building was maze-like, but he eventually found the main elevators which directed him to Allison’s office, suite 603. He made his way to her double doors and knocked on them.

“Jerry? Is that you?” Allison asked. “I told you you need to visit Hannah Sheath in Accounting.”

“Nope, it’s not Jerry,” Five said, opening the door. Allison looked up from her computer and her face was one of total confusion.

“Who are you? How did you get here?”

“I’m your long lost brother.”

“You’re definitely not.”

“Yes I am,” Five said, blinking up to her desk. Allison stood up and reeled back in shock.

“What the hell was that??”

“You and I and five other kids with superpowers were adopted in 1989 by Reginald Hargreeves. You know that billionaire that just died? Yeah, well, he erased your memories and everyone else’s when you were 17 and left you alone in the world.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Allison asked, coming back to her desk and sitting down.

“You’re an amnesiac, right? And you saw the blink, correct? We were adopted by him so he could train us to stop the apocalypse.”

Allison smiled. “Of course.”

Five rolled his eyes. He was still getting used to his new-old body. “Right. Well, you see, I remember what happened because I ran away when we were 13. I got stuck in the apocalypse we failed to solve for 45 years, and when I traveled back to 2019 two days ago I got stuck in this body again.”

Allison nodded. Five noted something tense about her demeanor. The gears in his head turned.

“You have a security button underneath your desk and you just pushed it. Right?” He asked with a sigh.

Her face changed as her eyebrows lowered and her mouth opened.

“DON’T RUMOR ME!” Five yelled, backing up. “Do not rumor me!”

“Why, are you immune? Is that part of our special powers?”

“Allison, if you rumor me to forget this ever happened I’m just going to come back.”

She didn’t seem convinced. “I heard a rumor--”

Five blinked out of the room and into the hallway, and started panicking. He realized how lucky he’d been that Klaus and Diego didn’t attack him. He could fight Diego and Klaus, he was sure of that, but Allison’s rumor can’t be fought. He can’t punch it or outmaneuver it.

The doors to the office opened and Allison came out. She opened her mouth when suddenly Klaus rounded the corner.

“Oh hey Five… what’s happening here?” he asked.

“Klaus? How did you get up here?”

“I just walked up.”

“I need better security,” Allison muttered.

“Look, look,” Five said. “This is our brother, Klaus. He can summon ghosts.”

“Hi.”

Allison suddenly seemed more hesitant to use her power. Five wasn’t sure why, maybe it was the other adult in the room, or maybe because she was starting to process what she had heard. Five had proven his powers, after all.

“Ghosts?” She asked, slightly nervous. Then her demeanor changed. “Prove it.”

“Geez, everyone wants me to summon ghosts all of a sudden--”

“Klaus, just do it!” Five cried.

He clenched his fists and a ghost walked right into the hallway. He was a deathly skinny middle-aged man. He dug a little deeper and made the ghost appear. Klaus noticed Five’s face turned into a small “o” too. He had to learn how to do this after the amnesia. Maybe he didn’t know how to do it before.

“What the--” he said. Allison gasped. The ghost turned and looked at her.

“Oh my God…” Allison said breathlessly. The man’s eyes narrowed.

“Allison Fema,” the man said, taking a step towards her. Allison took a step back.

“Stop, stop it,” Allison said, and she was, for some reason, almost crying. “Stop it now.”

Klaus released the ghost from their sight but he could still see and hear him.

“Hey!” The ghost cried at Klaus. “I wasn’t done. That lady murdered me!”

“Murdered you?” Klaus asked.

“What?” Allison asked.

“I came to her hoping to lose weight, and I lost so much that it killed me!” The man yelled at Klaus. “She refused to see me again because I couldn’t pay for another session to stop it!”

Klaus turned to Allison with a dark look in his eyes. “Did you really refuse to see that man again?” he asked her.

“It was a mistake! It was just when I was starting out-- I didn’t realize, I didn’t… I didn’t know!” Allison said.

“What the hell is happening?” Five asked.

“Can we go inside my office?” Allison asked. “I promise I won’t rumor you.”

Klaus crossed his arms. “I’m not sure I trust you.”

“Klaus, I can hold your arm the whole time. If she even starts, I can blink us both out of there.”

Klaus looked at the two of them, then at the ghost.

“Let me have my closure,” the ghost said.

“What do you want?”

“I want to…” the ghost paused. “I want to hurt her. Like she hurt me.”

“I don’t really like letting ghosts into me with the intention of hurting people.”

“Then make her pay my family for what she did. My name is Walter Abel, and my wife’s name is Olivia Abel. My kids are Jackie and Hannah.”

Klaus nodded.

The three walked into Allison’s office, where she called off security. They sat down, and Five kept his hand on Klaus’s arm as promised. Then the two more fully explained the situation. Allison’s face changed as the two told them the full story, shifting from skepticism to intrigue to sympathy.

“Six days?” she asked. “We have six days to stop it?”

“Yeah,” Five said.

There was a pause.

“Do you think you could rumor my memories back?” Klaus asked.

“I can try. I haven’t been able to do it to myself, but I don’t think I can rumor myself.”

Klaus nodded. “Well, it’s worth a shot.”

“I heard a rumor that all your pre-amnesia memories came back.”

Klaus’s eyes glazed over with white as Five had seen so many times before, and then they went back to green, and his face was blank. Five and Allison stared intently at him.

“Nothing happened…” Klaus said slowly.

Allison’s brow furrowed. “Can I not rumor you guys?”

“You can… or at least you could,” Five said. “Dad made you rumor our other sister, Vanya, into believing she was ordinary.”

“So why didn’t that work?”

“I’m not sure,” Five said slowly, mulling it over. “The memory wipe was just done with fancy technology. There’s no reason why your powers shouldn’t beat it. Nothing can beat your powers.” A realization suddenly struck. “Except… themselves.”

“What?” Klaus asked.

“Maybe before or after or during the memory wipe, dad forced Allison to rumor all of you with something along the lines of ‘I heard a rumor that Allison’s powers can’t bring your memory back.’ It was probably a failsafe in case any of you met each other in the future.”

“That sounds kind of paranoid,” Allison said.

“Dad was kind of paranoid.”

“Fair enough…”

“Or maybe he did something to the satellite. Either way, that’s a dead end, unfortunately. Anyways, back to the matter at hand, will you help us?”

“Uh, I mean, what’s the plan here? You collect all of us and then what?”

“Well, we-- we… find the cause of the apocalypse and stop it.”

“Any idea what the cause is?”

“Not at the moment, no. But I have different leads to follow with that.”

“Well… that’s great, but I have work and clients to attend to. I can’t just drop it all for some family reunion,” she said. The way she said “family reunion” made it clear she still wasn’t entirely convinced. “I’m not really sure how I can help, anyways.”

“Well you could help us get Luther,” Five said. “Besides Vanya, he’s the last one we need to contact.”

“Why do I need to get Luther? You all seem to be pretty good at getting everyone yourselves.”

“You and Luther were close as kids. Maybe that connection is still there.”

“Five, I don’t even know who that person is.”

“Fine. Whatever. Me or Diego can get in contact with him. We’re in suite 800 at the Royal Inn in town, if you want to contact us. We’ll be in contact with you.”

Five stood up to leave, and Klaus followed suit, but Allison wasn’t done.

“Wait, hold on. I don’t want you barging into my office again. Or my house. Or anywhere. Next time, call me or go to the front desk and tell Haley that you’re here to see me.”

“Who should we say we are?”

“We could use my last name,” Klaus said, “Geist.”

“Sure, say you’re the Geists and you’re here to see me. I’ll tell her to send you up.”

“Ok, fine,” Five said. “Could we use your phone before we go?”

“Uh, sure.”

Five walked out.

“Can I speak with you for a moment?” Klaus asked. Allison’s face dropped to one of fear again.

~~~

Five called Diego and told him that they met with Allison and she’s provisionally on the team. Diego’s next mission was to monitor the apartment of Henry Mellcot and wait for Luther to get back.

~~~

“Walter Abel’s family deserves better.” Klaus said. “He wants you to give money to his family and pay for what you did.”

“I’m so sorry--”

“Don’t apologize to me. Do what he asked. It’s the only way he can get peace.”

Allison nodded.

“And you’re lucky, you know. Because he wanted me to hurt you. This paying thing is a poor second choice due to what you did.”

“I didn’t know better!” Allison exploded. “It happened when I was just starting out and didn’t know as much about my powers! He came to me severely overweight and asked for my help, so I rumored him to ‘lose weight.’ At first he was one of our biggest success stories but then he wouldn’t stop losing weight. I just thought if he ate he’d be fine, I didn’t realize he would lose weight until he died. I’m more careful now. I always say specifically what the client wants to happen.”

“You still should’ve seen him again. You could’ve seen him again and rumored him to stop losing weight.”

“You don’t think I know that?” Allison asked quietly.

“You better do everything you can to make his family comfortable for the next 10 generations, and you better do everything you can to help us stop the apocalypse.”

“Do you really believe the world is gonna end in six days?”

“72 hours ago I didn’t believe there was anyone else like me on Earth.”

Allison gave a small, thoughtful nod, and Klaus left.

“I swear to God,” Klaus said to himself, “why does every member of this family have to be a murderer?”

~~~

Klaus met up with Five outside.

“Looks like we have a few free hours,” Klaus said as they left Allison’s offices.

“Think again. I want to teach you some Russian, and we can also go look at Mellcot’s apartment for Luther.”

The apartment was empty, so they went to their new hotel room, checked in, and Five taught Klaus some basic Russian phrases. Five himself was very rusty in Russian, but he still remembered his “hello,” “goodbye,” “right,” “left,” “where’s the bathroom,” and “my name is…”

“We’re really banking on Vanya speaking English, huh?”

“Yeah. I mean, she lives in Moscow and is part of the national orchestra. I think we have a good shot at her speaking at least some English. Or maybe you can find a bilingual ghost to translate for you.”

Klaus laughed.

“Oh, and here’s her address,” Five said, pulling the piece of paper out of his pocket.

Klaus looked at it and was about to attempt to read it out loud, but decided not to. “Thanks.”

“And beware of cabs. Make sure the cab you're getting is real before you hop in.”

“Five, I know about that. I’m the one who’s been living in society all these years.”

“Yeah,” Five said, looking down.

“Five… are you worried about me?” Klaus asked, holding back a small smile. It was kind of sweet how fast this kid bonded to him. It’d happened to Klaus before, once he got clean he learned he was really good with kids (it’s why he decided to become a child/teen therapist over an adult therapist) but he’d never had a bond like this before. In a weird sort of way, this kid he barely knew was starting to feel like his brother.

Five didn’t respond.

“Look I know she’s powerful or whatever, but I can handle it, okay?I managed to diffuse the situation with Allison. I’m trained for that sort of stuff. And besides, she’s just a violinist, not a millionaire CEO. She probably won’t be as hostile.”

Five shrugged. “Let’s hope so.”

Chapter Text

Five said goodbye to Klaus outside the hotel. He was first going to go to his apartment and give a proper goodbye to Aaron, then he would go to the airport. Five walked back up to the hotel room, at a loss for what to do for the first time in his memory. He opened the door to the empty, enormous, hotel room, and he couldn’t help but be reminded of their old bedroom’s upstairs, painted over, re-carpeted, and with all the personality systematically sucked out of them. He wondered how this hotel suite would look when all of his siblings were here.

“Hello, Five,” The Handler said, stepping out of the bathroom. “Thought any more about my little deal since I saw you last?”

“Oh, lots,” he replied.

“Have I piqued your interest?”

Five’s face fell into a flat, straight line.

“Well maybe you would like to think over it again. Come back with us, and we can restore your siblings’ memories and the original timeline.”

“But then the world still ends.”

“The world ends either way, Five, there’s nothing you or I can do about it. In fact, the original timeline helped us a lot in achieving the end of the world here. The difference will be whether or not you get to see the siblings you know again and survive it, or… not.”

Five narrowed his eyes. “I’m not about to let my siblings die. And these are the siblings I know.”

“Are they? Klaus, the clean and professional therapist? Allison, the cutthroat CEO who almost turned her power against you? Ben the hermit murderer? Diego, working 9 to 5 for the man?”

“They’re still my siblings. None of that matters. Come back to me when you have a better deal.”

“This is the best deal you’re gonna get, Five,” The Handler said with a smile.

“Even after all those years watching my every move in the apocalypse and at the Commission, you still don’t know me.”

“I think I do,” she said, and she opened her briefcase and disappeared.

Five stood still for a moment, and then started pacing around the room. He didn’t understand why she didn’t just take him. Why didn't she just send field agents or contractors to get him? Why come to him twice in peace with this idiotic deal?

The world ends either way.

Something about that struck him as odd. The Commission existed because the people in charge weren’t confident that the world was going to go along the right timeline. The confidence was a farce. She should be trying to get a better deal, telling him he’d save his siblings. She should be at least a little worried, right? She probably wasn’t worried because Five had no way to stop it yet. Five cursed himself for being so far behind on finding the cause of the apocalypse. He’d collected most of his siblings, but for what? What’s the point of having 7 people stand around waiting to stop the apocalypse with no way of knowing how to do it?

“What am I standing around here for?” He asked himself out loud. And then he walked out of the room and ordered a cab at the front desk.

~~~

Five took the cab to Griddy’s and walked the rest of the way to the mansion, and knocked on the front door, where Pogo let him in. Once the door was shut, Five got right down to business.

“You still haven’t told me what causes the apocalypse.”

“Hello to you too, Master Five.”

“Yes, hello, hello. What causes it? Or at least, what did dad think causes it?”

“I don’t know.”

“Like hell you don’t know, Pogo! You knew everything he knew!”

Pogo’s face turned into a frown. “I don’t like your tone, young man.”

Five was about to yell that he wasn’t a young man, but then realized that’d be very childish of him. And Pogo was right, he was being rude.

“I’m sorry. I’m just not at all close to finding the cause yet. I’ve been so focused on my siblings I haven’t worked out a plan for stopping it. I was hoping you could help.”

“Like I said, I don’t know. In fact, I don’t think your father knew for sure either. I believe he believed there was no way to tell the future.”

“Bullshit…” Five said under his breath. “Well then… could you help me look?”

“Look?”

“Through his things. I barely dove into any of the paper’s in his office last night.”

Pogo hesitated. “It wouldn’t be right to trifle through his things.”

“He’s dead, Pogo. It doesn’t matter anymore, remember?”

He sighed. “Alright, I suppose, as long as we keep things orderly.”

~~~

Klaus got on the plane without a hitch. Being on the plane though, was slightly unpleasant, as any long flight would be. It was 17 hours in total, with two stops. Pogo had at least gotten first class tickets, but a 17 hour flight sucks ass even if you had a private jet to yourself. Klaus ordered himself a ginger ale and tried to read the in-flight magazines, and then tried to sleep, which proved incredibly difficult. For as long as he could remember, he had trouble sleeping anywhere that wasn’t his bed. He did sleep, but poorly, and in short intervals.

He arrived in Russia at 3pm on Wednesday (8am Five’s time) groggy and miserable. He went through customs, got some airport coffee, and managed to find a cab to his hotel that probably (definitely) overcharged him but at least didn’t shank him. He checked into his hotel with minimal trouble (the woman behind the desk spoke fluent English, and it was clear that this was a hotel designed for dumb American/western European tourists). He brought his suitcase up to his room and fought the urge to collapse onto his bed and sleep until doomsday. Instead he pulled out the address Five had given, and the phone number, and reached over to the phone to call his long-lost sister.

~~~

Five and Pogo found some very old essays from the 60s about why the nuclear apocalypse wasn’t nigh, but unfortunately nothing more recent than that.

“I don’t understand,” Five said. “He talked about the apocalypse all the time when we were kids. Klaus broke a plate once and he said ‘how can you be expected to save the world if you can’t even save dishware!’”

“I don’t know either, Master Five. He was always rather vague with me about an apocalyptic threat as well.”

“Where else did he keep his work? This can’t be it, right?”

“Well, there was the D.S. Manufacturing Co. offices.”

“Of course,” Five said, gritting his teeth and wondering why he didn’t think of that himself. But then again… “But wouldn’t he keep his most secretive stuff here? Away from the prying eyes of employees?”

“Or perhaps he wanted to keep documents away from prying children.”

“Yes, but the children have been gone for 12 years.”

“I don’t know what to tell you, Master Five. I sincerely do not know. You are free to look around the mansion as you please.”

Five’s first venture was to the basement. He took the elevator down and found the soundproof cage where Vanya was stored away as a small child. He opened the door and stood in the entryway. It wasn’t as big as he thought it would be when Reg described it in the journal. It was small, and dark. How awful it would’ve been to be secluded down here for a month as a 4-year-old.

Five then left the creepy, awful room and looked around the walls of the basement for secret entrances or cracks. The concrete maze was empty… too empty. After checking the walls thoroughly he checked the floors, but still found nothing. He checked the elevator for secret buttons or panels. At this point he was growing upset with his lack of progress and went back up to the first floor. Pogo was waiting for him with Diego.

“Master Diego arrived while you were downstairs.”

“Hi,” Five said.

“Hi. I checked out Mellcot’s apartment, but I didn’t see anyone who matched Luther’s description. I called the hotel room and didn’t get an answer, so I thought I’d try here.”

“Great. Klaus is on his way to Russia. Could you help me search for hidden rooms?”

“Uh, sure.”

The two went back down to the basement (after all, Diego had police training and was a fresh pair of eyes, so it couldn’t hurt) and searched it again.

“What’s this?” Diego asked, when he found Vanya’s prison.

“It’s where dad kept Vanya when he deemed her powers too dangerous,” Five said in his usual deadpan tone. “He told us she was ill and kept her here for a month while he fine-tuned the drugs he put her on.”

“Damn. That’s fucked up.”

“He did a lot of fucked up things, Diego,” Five wanted to tell Diego then about Klaus and the mausoleum, but decided against that. Klaus should know first.

“Like what?”

“Well after he decided Vanya would be better off ‘ordinary’ he systematically isolated her from the rest of us. She was as little a part of our childhood as he could make it.”

“And we went along with it?”

“We were children, Diego,” Five said, but he felt guilty inside. He reached out to Vanya the most, but he spent plenty of time in the past 45 years wondering how he could’ve done more. Been a better friend. Been a better brother.

“What else?”

“So much more. I don’t have time to get into all of it right now. We need to find where he kept his most secret documents.”

“Hold on, we haven’t searched through here, yet.”

Five paused. He hadn’t searched Vanya’s prison. He assumed it was built around the time Reggie thought Vanya might get out of hand, and would therefore have placed his secret space somewhere else. Unless he built the prison in front of it to better hide it, or built a new one behind it.

Five made a beeline for the back wall of the prison and searched the soundproof foam for a hidden crack. Diego did the same.

“I found something…” Diego said.

“What?”

“Right here, a seam.”

Five looked and saw the seam too. Diego traced it up to the height of a door and down again.

“I’m going to blink back there,” Five said.

“Wait, what if it’s just wall? What if Hargreeves boarded it up? Or it could be filled with filing cabinets and you’ll get crushed to death. It’s too big of a risk. We’ll find a way to open it.”

“There’s no way to open it just by prodding around a bit. Dad would make it prod-proof. I have to blink in there. Just four feet in front of us. I doubt there’s that much wall.”

Diego was still hesitant, a face Five wasn’t sure he’d ever seen before on Diego. Becoming a copper made him a lot more cautious, or perhaps it was just growing up.

Five learned to be cautious in the apocalypse. But he also learned when not to be cautious. He looked Diego in the eyes and blinked into the unknown.

The unknown turned out to be an even more cluttered office. Filing cabinets on all sides, and a desk in the middle. Papers everywhere. Five managed to get his footing between the door and the desk. The door had a keypad on it with symbols he didn’t recognize. They weren’t any alphabet he was aware of, nor were they masonic or any sort of code he was familiar with. He banged on the door.

“DIEGO?!” He yelled. “Wait, you idiot. That room is soundproof.”

Five blinked back out. “There’s an office back there alright.”

“Thank God,” Diego said, clearly relieved.

“I can take you back there.”

“Can you?”

“I think so. I’ve been able to take things with me before.”

“Yeah, but a person is more than a thing.”

“Do you want to help me or not?”

“Alright.”

Five grabbed Diego and they blinked into the room.

“Oh, I’m gonna be sick,” Diego said, bending over and leaning on the table. Five rolled his eyes.

“You’re fine,” he said.

Diego stabilized himself quietly and looked around the small office (it would’ve been less small with the not insubstantial filing cabinets lining everywhere except the door, but as it was, the office could probably fit one more person in it, two more if everyone was willing to be uncomfortable).

Diego pulled on a filing cabinet handle. “It’s locked.”

“Dammit.”

“I can try to pick it.”

“Go for it. I’m gonna start with these papers out here,” Five said, going to the desk.

“So… do you think this is newer or older than the chamber?” Diego asked to break the silence.

“I don’t know,” Five replied, “but if I had to hazard a guess I’d say newer. I mean, look at how small it is. It doesn’t seem like a place to conduct his most secretive research and experiments. To me it seems like… overflow parking.”

Diego nodded, not looking away from the lock he was picking. “That makes sense. Still, better overflow parking than no parking.”

Five sighed. “Here’s hoping.”

After a few minutes of rustling and silence, Diego picked the lock.

“Uh, what are we searching for, again?” Diego asked, as he opened the very full top drawer of the cabinet to the left of the door.

“Anything on the apocalypse. Preferably after the 1960s.”

“Ah, ok,” Diego said, and he started to rifle through the papers.

The two searched fruitlessly for an indeterminate amount of time, until Diego’s stomach growled loudly.

“Hey,” he said, “Wanna go get dinner?”

“I’m kinda busy here,” Five said, annoyed.

“It’s kinda 9pm. And I haven’t eaten since noon. Klaus has gotten all this time to get to know you but I’ve been busy with my job. If we’re brothers, shouldn’t family bonding be in order?”

Five paused. “We never excelled at family bonding,” he said tiredly.

“Yeah well, that was then with a manipulative father and prepubescent brains. Now we’re all adults with a fresh start. And don’t tell me you’re not hungry. I’ve heard your stomach too.”

Five sighed. He did miss Diego. He missed his competitive nature and obstinance, and the good nature at his core. And the room was getting rather stuffy.

“Fine. I’ll blink us out of here and we can go get dinner.”

Chapter Text

Diego drove them to a 24 hour diner chain and they got seated at a brightly-lit booth. Diego picked up the menu and thumbed through it. Five sat in the booth uncomfortably and twiddled his thumbs.

“What’s the matter?” Diego asked.

“Nothing, nothing,” Five said. “We just have five goddamn days to stop the apocalypse, and I’ve accomplished nothing.”

Diego gave him an odd look. “I think you’ve accomplished a lot in 3 days. I mean, you’ve collected 4 out of the 6 other members of the Umbrella Academy, and Klaus is collecting the 5th right now, and it’s just a matter of time before we get the final one. You’ve learned the cause of our amnesia and learned that Allison can’t undo it. You’ve got Pogo on your side. That’s a lot.”

“But none of it matters if I can’t stop the apocalypse!”

“How do you know just coming here and finding us hasn’t stopped it?”

“I know I haven’t stopped it, because my boss at the Commission keeps reaching out to me.”

“Yeah… you never really fully explained the whole ‘Commission’ thing.”

“After 45 years alone a woman named The Handler who is part of a big organization called the Commission came and picked me up and trained me to be an assassin. I lived and worked there for several months before breaking my contract and coming back to 2019 and getting stuck in this twip of a body.”

“Ok… but what does the Commission do, exactly, beside train people to murder other people?”

“It monitors and fixes the ‘correct’ timeline, which dad apparently changed.”

“Wait, what?”

“This amnesia thing wasn’t supposed to happen. I don’t know how, but dad managed to beat the Commission and change the timeline. However, the Commission somehow got the apocalypse back on schedule anyways.”

Diego’s eyes furrowed, and Five saw the gears moving behind his eyes.

“So… were you living in the original apocalypse? The one that was supposed to happen, or this new apocalypse that is going to happen?”

“I don’t know.”

“But… that change wouldn’t affect you, right? Until you came back?”

“Well… in the original timeline, I suppose dad doesn’t kill Hazel and Cha Cha, so they would’ve been my coworkers,” Five saw the confusion on Diego’s face. “They’re Commission legends. The specifics don’t matter.”

“But, for the sake of argument, your actions were unaffected until you came back?”

“I don’t know, Diego.”

“Coz if they weren’t… wouldn’t you be doing the same thing you’re doing now?”

“What?”

“Hi guys, my name’s Grant, I’m going to be your waiter this lovely evening, can I getcha any drinks to start off with?” the waiter said.

“Coffee. Black.” Five said.

“Water’s fine for me.”

“Wonderful,” Grant said, and he exited.

“What I was saying was,” Diego continued, “Imagine a world where our memories weren’t erased. You came back to 2019, collected all of us, and tried to stop the apocalypse. It didn’t work.”

Five’s mouth opened with shock and understanding. Shock that Diego put this together before he did, and understanding of what Diego meant.

“So basically, the Commission already saw a whole timeline where I abandoned them and tried to stop the apocalypse, and they tried to stop me, and I still failed… which means they knew I would do it again. The Handler knew I would go back to 2019 on the Kennedy mission. And they planned for it. They planned on me doing the exact goddamn thing. That’s why she’s been giving me such a shitty deal. Because if I act like myself the apocalypse still happens. Fuck… she does know me…”

Diego nodded. “Exactly.”

“So the question is now… how to beat it? If I act wildly out of character- well, that might be expected if this conversation is planned- but on the other hand maybe I should just act normally? Or would that be expected? And what about the rest of you? Your behavior probably impacts the apocalypse…” Five rambled on.

“Five. Five,” Diego said, reaching over and touching his shoulder. Five gave a little jolt, before stopping and looking at his brother. “Let’s talk about something else, huh? You’re gonna wither away to nerves and coffee if you keep going like this.”

Five looked down, but otherwise didn’t respond. “Dinner…” he said quietly.

“Yeah, when’s the last time you went to a diner like this?”

“A knockoff chain diner? Never. I did go to an authentic 50’s diner once on a job, course, I didn’t really get a chance to enjoy the food.”

“Hm…” Diego said, he then looked thoughtful for a moment, and asked a new question. “Can you tell me any good memories that happened when we were kids?”

~~~

“How much have you got?” Allison asked Luther.

“37 cents.”

Allison smiled slyly. “I got $1.09.”

Luther’s face widened with shock. “How??”

“You should’ve been first to the couches.”

“Throw it in the pot, doofuses,” Five said. “It doesn’t matter how much we each got individually, it matters if we each have enough for a donut all together.”

Allison and Luther added their money to the “pot,” aka Five’s desk, and Five organized the coins.

“Their contributions take us up to $5.63.”

“Is that enough for all of us?” Klaus asked hopefully.

Five’s face remained in an enigmatic line. “A donut at Griddy’s costs 99 cents each. Plus tax, we don’t have enough for the six of us.”

A groan fell over the children. They’d be 11 tomorrow, and they really wanted a treat.

“There’s got to be more money somewhere,” Ben said. “Allison, did you really check all the couches?”

She nodded. “And all the big cushy chairs.”

“And everyone looked under their beds?” Luther asked. They all nodded.

“We could try drawers,” Diego said. “Like in the kitchen, or maybe there’s some change lost in the library.”

“Nobody keeps money in the kitchen or library,” Luther retorted.

“Well nobody keeps money in the couch!”

There was a very soft knock at the door. The six looked up to see Vanya waiting shyly in the entrance to Five’s room, clutching something in her hands.

“Hi Vanya,” Five said.

“I… I heard you guys were planning on going to Griddy’s and I want in,” she said, as bravely as she could.

Before anyone could cut her out, Five spoke first. “How much do you have?”

“$3,” she said, walking over and showing her handful of quarters. The other kids looked at the pile like the coins were Spanish Galleons instead of ordinary quarters.

“Where did you get that?” Klaus asked.

“Pogo gives me 50 cents every time I dust the upper shelves in the library, or polish the frames of mom’s paintings.”

“Lucky…” Klaus whispered under his breath.

“That should be enough, guys,” Five said, taking the quarters. “I think that should be enough.”

The mood in the room immediately lightened and turned joyous, a feeling the Umbrella Academy didn’t often get to share together.

What followed was the best birthday ever. That night, after they should’ve gone to bed, Five snuck them out one by one and they went to Griddy’s as a group. They each ordered their one donut, and the lady behind the counter, being a woman with too big of a heart, let the kids have as many as they wanted for free.

~~~

Five smiled sadly as he finished the story.

“I love how you picked one were you got to be the hero and I was picking fights with my brother,” Diego said with a loving smirk, taking a bite of his pancakes (they ordered and food arrived in the middle of the story, Diego got regular pancakes and Five got chocolate-chip pancakes).

“In my defense you guys fought all the time.”

“No, that’s a cute story though. Why didn’t we include Vanya in the first place?”

Five sighed. “The short version is: our manipulative father.”

“Ah. That must’ve sucked for her. What if she doesn’t want to come back?”

“Diego. Amnesia. She has it too.”

“I know but… you do seem… I dunno… familiar. Like I think if some random kid came up to me with your story I wouldn’t believe them, but I believe you, for some reason.”

“Well I have powers like you and Sir Hargreeves’s butler knows me personally, so that helps.”

“Yeah, I know, but that doesn’t mean your story is true.”

Five rolled his eyes. “I guess. Sure.”

“What do you think you’re gonna do when it’s over?” Diego asked, before taking another bite.

“When the apocalypse is over? You mean if we stop it?”

“Yeah.”

Five paused. “We’ll get there when we get there,” he said enigmatically.

“Fair enough,” Diego replied. “I mean, it took me a while to figure out where to go with my life.”

“That reminds me… what was it like when you woke up? What happened?” Five asked. Klaus had given him a pretty good overview of the past 12 years of his life, but Diego was just amnesia → ??? → police.

“I woke up on a bench in Tilly Heyward park. I was in pain… looking back on it, it was probably from sleeping on a bench all night, but I didn’t remember anything and I freaked out so I went to the hospital. They gave me a place to stay for a few nights, but I knew I couldn’t live there forever. I got a job as a waiter in a Greek restaurant and saved up, figured out I wanted to be a policeman and got a scholarship and clawed and scraped my way through.”

Five couldn’t help but feel that it was a little heroic. Even if he wasn’t particularly fond of where some of his siblings wound up, they did all claw and scrap their way up from nothing. Looking back on it, Five felt like he led such a soft life in the academy, and in some ways it was. 3 delicious meals a day, the best education, and siblings he loved. But in other ways it wasn’t. Even with their memories wiped, his siblings still knew how to fight hard to survive. They all did.

“My life was finally starting to get settled, and then you came.”

“Sorry.”

Diego shrugged. “I mean, dying’s worse, right? I’ve never had a family before. It… might be nice.”

Five ate his pancakes and sipped on his coffee.

“Yeah…” he said after a long pause.

~~~

After dinner, Diego drove him back to the hotel.

“Look, I got tomorrow afternoon off,” he said as he pulled up to the entrance. “That’s all I was able to manage.”

“Well, that’s something.”

“You want me to meet you at the mansion? Keep looking for documents?”

“Sure.”

Five got out of the car and walked up to his lonely hotel suite. He picked out a room for himself, took off his shoes, and got under the covers.

Five days left to save the world.

Chapter Text

Klaus dialed Vanya’s phone number. He was shaking a bit as he did it.

“Privet?” A woman on the other end said.

“Hello?” Klaus asked.

“Hello??” The woman asked in a mild Russian accent. “Who are you?”

“Hi, uh, my name is Klaus Geist, and, um, I’m your brother.”

“What??”

“I said I’m your brother,” Klaus said, he thumbed through his pocket English-to-Russian dictionary he got at the airport. “I’m your… brat,” he said, holding back a bit of idiotic American laughter.

“I understand what a brother is,” the woman said, somewhat contemptuously. “But I don’t have an American brother.”

“Yes, yes you do! This is Vanya Obychnyy, right? First chair in the Russian National Orchestra?”

“Yes…? But I don’t have a brother.”

“You have amnesia, right? You woke up one day at 17 with no knowledge of who you were?”

“Yes. Everyone knows that. You read my article in the Times. So what?”

Klaus cursed himself for not reading the article Aaron had saved before his flight. “Ok, but does everyone know you have superpowers? You can control sound, Vanya. It’s why you’re such an enchanting violinist.”

The line went quiet.

“Hello?” Klaus asked.

“Hi, yes, I’m still here.”

“Look, I know it’s hard to believe, but I went through the same thing too. I woke up one day with amnesia and superpowers and no place in the world, and that’s precisely one man’s fault. In 1989 the two of us and five other children were adopted by Sir Reginald Hargreeves. Have you heard of him?”

“Yes.”

“And at 17 something happened, and he decided he didn’t want us anymore, so he wiped our minds. He wiped the minds of everyone in the world and ditched us. I’m guessing you woke up here in Russia?”

“Yes…”

“It might’ve been partially because… well, he was scared of you.”

“Why should I believe any of this?! It’s ridiculous! Why didn’t you reach out before? If you have amnesia, how do you know we are siblings?”

“I only found out 3 days ago. Look, it’s a long story, and it’d be better told in person. Could I meet you somewhere, like a coffee shop, or restaurant, or bookstore?”

“How do I know you’re not crazy?” Vanya asked. If anything, that was a good sign. It told Klaus she was interested. But he also wasn’t sure what to tell her. She had every reason to be concerned about meeting a strange man with crazy theories. But he wasn’t sure what to say. She was just famous enough that any basic knowledge would be easy to find, and he didn’t really know anything about her. All he knew was powers.

And Allison’s rumor.

Klaus wasn’t stupid. He knew bits and pieces of his childhood had fallen through the cracks of Hargreeves’s mind wipe. His recurring nightmares, the fact that he was drawn to his rebellion scratched in the closet so quickly, and other tiny things. Perhaps the effects of Allison’s rumor hadn’t worn off completely.

“Do you feel the need to prove yourself because you’ve always thought you’re just… ordinary?” Klaus said. It was a gamble. It was the biggest gamble he’d taken since he’d stopped gambling with his life. If he was wrong, Vanya would never want to contact him again, but if he was right, she’d believe him.

The silence changed over the phone, or perhaps Klaus only imagined it had.

“How did you know that?” Vanya asked, almost in an accusatory tone.

“Because that’s what you were told our whole childhood,” Klaus responded. It was true, and the rumor thing could be gotten into later.

“I can meet you today at 17 o’clock at La Caffee in Ulitissa Rabochaya. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Do Svidaniya, er, bye.”

“Bye,” Klaus said, before hanging up the phone. “1700? That’s… 5 o’clock? Right? Yeah.”

~~~

Five woke up right about when Klaus and Vanya were having their phone call. He sighed, got up, got dressed, and went downstairs for some complimentary coffee. There was a whole big continental breakfast buffet too, but he wasn’t hungry.

He contemplated how to spend his morning. Should he go straight to the mansion? Should he go meet Ben? Should he try to get in contact with Luther?

He thought about last night with Diego, and how nice it was to take it slow. How nice it was for Diego to get to know him, and for him to get to know Diego again. He was still somewhat the same Diego, but he was different, too. No longer chomping at the bit to fight someone, no longer so worried about being the leader. Five wondered if Diego had to go to speech therapy again for his stutter. Diego didn’t mention it at all, so Five was left in the dark.

Five hadn’t taken a night slow in… forever. He legitimately couldn’t remember the last time he’d done that.

Well, that’s not true, dear.

“You’re right,” Five mumbled. “I should count my nights with you.” But at the same time he couldn’t, because deep down in his heart of hearts he knew Dolores wasn’t a person. Dolores was a part of him, a part he had sculpted and given sequins, but it was still him. A true nice, quiet, but fun night like the one he just had requires at least one other person.

And then the other side of it. How could he outmaneuver the Commission now? They got to see what happened in the aborted timeline. He could never know for sure what he did. He knew now that the next time the Handler came he’d have to take her deal. Until then, play it cool. They weren’t really watching all the time.

He drank the coffee quickly.

“Screw it, I guess,” he said to himself. “Back to the mansion it is.”

~~~

“You have to know something. He must’ve given you an inkling of an idea, once, right? He’s not perfect.”

Pogo shook his head. “I’m sorry, Master Five. If I knew what to do I would have done it already.”

“He must’ve slipped up, given you some hint, some clue…” Five said, pacing back and forth. “Or maybe he gave us a clue… or Grace…”

Five blinked over to Pogo. “When dad erased her memory, did he store the stuff he erased anywhere?”

Pogo thought for a moment. “Why I… I think he did.”

~~~

Five looked at the room, hidden behind a cleaning supplies closet in a backwards part of the mansion.

“Why didn’t you show me this before?” Five deadpanned.

“You never asked,” Pogo replied evenly, uncovering the old, gigantic computer.

Five thought that was a pretty shitty reason, but he knew Pogo hadn’t completely shed his allegiance to his father.

The computer took up the whole room, like computers of old, but otherwise didn’t particularly look like an old-timey 1930s computer. It looked powerful.

Pogo uncovered a part of the computer underneath a tarp. There was a screen there the size of a middle-sized TV, and lots of buttons and dials, and a keyboard.

“If I remember correctly,” Pogo said slowly, turning that second of the computer on, “This is where Master Hargreeves stored backups of Grace’s memory.

Start-up sounds filled the room, and Five peered closer at the monitor. It buzzed with life, but then remained blank.

“What do you want to see?” Pogo asked, anticipating Five’s train of thought.

“Can you search by keyword?”

“No, only by date.”

“Well that’s exceedingly unhelpful,” Five said, running his hands through his hair. “Alright, let’s test it. March 1st, 2002. When we all got home.”

Pogo typed in the date and time. They both remembered that fateful day where the Umbrella Academy was revealed to the world.

The screen showed the world through Grace’s eyes, as the triumphant Umbrella Academy returned home after a successful unveiling.

They entered the house in numerical order. Five couldn’t remember if Reginald made them do it, or it happened out of habit, or by strange coincidence. So, Luther bounded in first.

“Hello Luther!” Grace said.

“Hi mom! Gawd, I wish you coulda been there, I threw a guy through the wall!”

Grace laughed. Diego ran in just behind Luther, and the rest followed through. Diego gave Grace a quick hug and let go, and started talking about the mission excitedly. Five felt Grace’s pride at how far Diego had come. Allison and Klaus high-fived, and then Klaus turned around to high-five him. Five watched himself look up, and then hold up his hand. Klaus slapped it with such force that just by watching it, Five could remember the sting. Ben came in slowly behind him, still covered in blood (dad made him sit on a towel on the ride home).

“Oh dear,” Grace said, “I shall have to draw you a bath.”

“Thanks, mom,” Ben said so quietly that Five could barely hear it. Finally, Vanya and Reginald walked in. Vanya’s posture was rigid, but she was looking at the ground. She was carrying Reginald’s supplies and quickly exited out of frame. Reginald was standing tall and proud. He gave Grace a smug and satisfied smile, and then went the opposite way. Grace turned and went upstairs to go draw Ben a bath. Pogo paused it.

“Well?”

Five sighed. “Well… it works, at least,” he said, semi-defeatedly.

“You can also watch it at up to three times speed,” Pogo said, showing Five a dial that had 0.1x up to 3x on it. “If you want to go through footage faster.”

“I’d prefer not to have to do this at all,” Five replied with a sigh.

“I’m sorry Master Five, if you want to look through Grace’s memories, this is the only way to do it.”

Five was suddenly struck with an idea. “I’m an idiot… why don’t we just give Grace her memories back? Then she can tell us anything she knows herself.”

Pogo looked severely uncomfortable.

“Pogo? What is it?” Five asked, getting exasperated.

“That would be in direct conflict to your father’s wishes--”

“He’s DEAD. He’s DEAD, Pogo! How many times do I need to tell you that HE’S DEAD!!” Five cried.

Pogo looked at Five with a stern but quiet face.

“Do you have any IDEA what it’s like to be lied to your entire childhood, to have things deliberately held from you, to be manipulated, to be show ponies for your narcissistic father? I’m sick and tired of it Pogo! It’s been 45 years since I saw the old bastard and I’m still sick and tired of it! And I don’t care about your fucking life debt to him!”

Pogo stood up. “Fine. Do whatever you want, Master Five, but I won’t be a part of it anymore. Give Grace her memories back, bring your siblings here for a party, burn the place down for all I care. Just stop involving me in it.”

Pogo then turned and swiftly walked away, more swiftly than Five had ever seen him walk before, even when he was a decade younger.

Five stood there in silence. He hadn’t been reprimanded by anyone he cared about in…decades, not really. Not since he stopped trying to vy for his father’s affections all those years ago. After that, Reggie’s lectures lost their bite, and Grace’s reminders not to track mud in the house never hurt that much anyways. (He was kidding himself a little bit, Reggie’s lectures always had a sting.) No one at the Commission dared to yell at him, and Dolores’s lectures never included things he didn’t already know and feel. For the first time, he almost felt like he belonged in his twerpy little body. He wanted Pogo to live and be happy too, even if he was kind of an asshole.

The only positive to this is that it was very out of character for Pogo to yell at him, especially like that, so maybe he was on track to ending the apocalypse.

Five took a deep breath and turned to the computer and messed around with it until he figured out where to plug Grace in to restore her memories. The trouble was getting Grace down here. Pogo let Grace know that Five was a friend and not a threat (same with Klaus and Diego) but to her, Five was still a stranger. Well, he’d solved crazy situations before, so now he’d just have to do it again.

Five went upstairs and looked for Grace, but didn’t see Pogo. He assumed Pogo was in his office or bedroom and gave them a wide berth. Eventually, he found Grace down in the kitchen, cooking and humming a little tune.

“M-- Grace?” Five said slowly, peaking around the corner.

Grace turned.

“Oh, hello Mr. Five.”

“Just… Five, is fine.”

Grace nodded.

“I was wondering if you could help me with something?”

She smiled. “Why sure I can! Just let me finish up here.”

Five sighed quietly with relief, unbelievably glad that she was back to her congenial old self.

Five sat down at the table, across from Grace, watching her.

“So, what can I help you with?” she asked.

“Well, um, I really need to show you in order to explain it.”

“Would you like a snack while you wait?”

“I’m--” Five was about to say “I’m good,” but decided against it. Following his first instincts was a bad idea now, and he knew that, but he couldn’t entirely break character.

“Could I have a marshmallow and peanut butter sandwich, please?” he said.

“Why of course,” Grace paused what she was doing to make him a quick sandwich, handed it to him, and went back to what she was doing. Five took a bite out of the sticky sandwich and was transported back to a simpler time.

Grace finished cooking, and put what she made in the fridge for later.

“Are you done?” she asked Five.

“Mm-hm,” he said. She took the plate from him and laid it in the sink.

“All ready?” he asked.

She nodded, and they went on their way.

As they walked to the hidden computer room, Grace grew quiet.

“Do you recognize this place?” Five asked when they entered.

“Reggie never showed me this room… it’s not on my map…” she said slowly.

“Can you sit down here?” Five asked, showing Grace the chair.

“What is this place?”

“It’s the place where you’re going to get your memories back.”

“My memories?”

“Dad, I mean, Hargreeves erased some of them and stored them here. Just uh, relax, and it’ll be fine.”

Grace complied, and Five found the port to plug her into the computer. He thought he saw curiosity on her face.

“Now, this might give you duplicate memories, if it re-uploads things you still have-- I’m not really sure, but… I guess you can probably deal with that,” Five said, before starting the process. Grace didn’t reply.

When it started, Grace visibly shut off and slumped over. Five stood back and waited for the progress bar to fill, which took nearly 30 minutes (Five was sitting on the ground and leaning against the computer, waiting, by the end). When the process finished, Grace’s eyes lit up with blue again, and she sat up, completely emotionless. She unplugged herself and then stared off into space.

“Mom?” Five asked, standing up.

“Yes, Five?” she said, without a smile.

“Do… you remember me?”

“Yes. I remember everything,” she said, getting up and leaving quickly.

“Well, hey, wait!” Five said, catching up to her. “I need to ask you something. About the apocalypse!”

Grace didn’t stop. She walked ahead with a rapid pace, up to her “room.” She took the painting of the woman that Diego said was her favorite, and promptly threw it over the ledge.

“Mom!!” Five cried, as he watched it crash into the foyer, destroying the frame and ripping the painting. “What the hell was that for??”

Grace turned and reached for another painting, and threw it over the ledge too.

“MOM!” Five cried, physically trying to block her from throwing another one. It was only after his instinctual reaction that he realized she could easily toss him aside like a ragdoll, but he held his position anyways. He knew Grace wouldn’t.

Until he saw the anger in her eyes.

“Mom, why are you doing this?” He asked, genuinely terrified for the first time he could remember.

“He took my babies from me, and then made it so I wouldn’t remember them. I hate him.” Grace said with more quiet intensity than he had ever seen from his father.

Chapter Text

“Mom, you have every right to be mad at dad,” Five said, after he’d gotten Grace to sit down. “I’m pissed as hell at him too. But destroying things isn’t going to help.”

“Why not? Destruction can be a great way to process your emotions. Remember when Luther punched a hole in his wall?”

“After…” Five pondered for a moment, “Diego put a knife through the middle of his favorite toy car?”

Grace nodded, “Yes exactly. He certainly got all his anger out that day.”

“Mom, we were seven.”

“Yes.”

Five blinked. “Look, the world is going to end in five days.”

“Yes, I know.”

Five’s eyes widened with anticipation. “So you know about the apocalypse?”

“Yes.”

“How can I stop it?”

Grace opened her mouth, but then she paused. “Well… it might not be the same anymore.”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re important. You’re all important, and he erased your memories. That changes things.”

Five thought this over. “Great… so only the Commission knows now how the world is going to end… well, how did dad think it was going to end before?”

“Something about… the moon.”

~~~

Klaus waited outside the coffee house for Vanya. It was a miracle he managed to even make it there, given that everything was in Russian. He had to ask for directions after getting lost from about 6 different people before he found a woman who was fluent enough in English to get him there. It also didn’t help that with his fashion sense and general aura, he stuck out like a sore, queer, American thumb.

A small woman with long brown hair approached him.

“Are you Klaus?” she asked cautiously.

“Yeah!” Klaus said excitedly. “Are you Vanya?”

She nodded. “Let’s go inside?”

“Sure.”

They sat at a table by the window and Klaus tried to start up a conversation.

“So you woke up here in Russia?”

She nodded. “Yes. Outside of Moscow. But that is common knowledge. Tell me about you and how you know we’re siblings.”

Klaus gave her the whole spiel, during which her skepticism was never fully alleviated.

“You still sound crazy,” she said at the end.

“Did you wake up with that accent?” he asked, “Or with an American one? Genuinely curious.”

“I-- it was, let’s get back to you. You believe this child is a 58-year-old man?”

“Yeah, pretty much. I know it’s crazy, but he’s proved it with his powers and the fact that Hargreeves’s butler knows him, and he’s kind of… familiar.”

“Do I feel… familiar?”

“Well I didn’t feel it immediately with him or Diego, only after I knew them a little bit.”

“How do you know your brain isn’t choosing to make him feel familiar because you want them to be your brothers?”

“How come I have to answer all of your questions but you don’t have to answer mine?”

Vanya paused and looked down. “Fair point… I woke up with an American accent.”

“So this Russian one, it’s a show?”

“No, I mean, it pulled on me. My accent changed… a bit.”

Klaus thought that was weird. It’s not like every adult who moves to a new country loses their accent (quite the opposite, in fact), but he decided to give Vanya some slack. He did feel kind of new and malleable those first few weeks. Perhaps if he’d been shipped off to Germany or somewhere else he would’ve acquired the local accent.

“Now you.”

“Well, I guess I don’t know for sure, but you know when you’re faking things, right?”

“Not always. The placebo effect.”

“Touche. Counterpoint: what would I have to gain by lying about all of this? By wasting my money flying out here with a ridiculous story? If I was lying, wouldn’t I pick a believable story?”

Vanya considered this. “Well, what are we supposed to do about it? The world ends in five days, and then what?”

“Well, the plan on how to stop it is really Five’s thing. I’m just the messenger.”

“Well what has he told you about the plan?”

Klaus squirmed a little. “Nothing. Yet. But he’s really smart. I believe he’s formulating one right now.”

“Hm. I see.”

“Do you? Do you see?”

“I knew Americans were crazy,” she said under her breath.

“You’re American!”

“You said I was born in Russia.”

“Yeah but you were only here for a few days, you were raised in America.”

“And now I don’t remember that. I only remember being Russian.”

“Whatever, that doesn’t matter,” Klaus said. “Are you coming with me?”

“To America?”

“The money’s covered, don’t worry about that.”

“It still sounds crazy.”

“I know it sounds crazy, but I also know it’s the truth, and that we need you. Five needs you. He’s adamant we need all of us to stop it.”

Vanya thought this over in silence for several long, painful seconds. There’s much more of a cost for Vanya to come than anyone else (except maybe Ben, depending on how you count it). Leaving your home country and coming thousands of miles away for a foreign family you didn’t know.

Still, Klaus had managed to convince Ben, a murderer in hiding to join (conditionally), so convincing Vanya, a law-abiding citizen with nothing to hide should be easy.

“You’ll pay for the whole trip?” Vanya asked, looking up at him slyly.

“Well I won’t, personally, it’s Hargreeves’s money. I mean, I suppose technically it should be ours, but I think Pogo is the person-- y’know what, yes. The whole trip is all expenses paid.”

Vanya nodded. “We leave tomorrow?”

“Well, tonight, if possible.”

“Very well. I will pack and meet you at the hotel.”

“When?”

“As soon as possible, Geist.”

“Ok, Obychnyy.”

~~~

“Ok, the moon, that’s a start,” Five said. “What about the moon, exactly?”

“He had Pogo monitor the moon religiously. Sometimes I would help too. When he sent Luther there, he was instructed to carry out tests.”

Five nodded. “I know about that. He planted an Academy flag, took some dirt, and did some elementary readings of the make-up of the moon. Wasn’t he looking for water or something?”

“Well yes, that, but Luther also performed tests for him that he didn’t know he was doing. He kept it from all of you.”

“Like what?”

“Detailed mapping of the far side of the moon.”

“How could Luther have done that and not known?”

“I believe the secret stuff was embedded in the stuff Luther knew he was doing. So by setting off an above-board process, he was also setting off a secret one.”

Five nodded, understanding. “Shit!” he cried. “Diego found stuff on the moon last night, I didn’t realize it’d be important.”

“I don’t really know if it is.”

“Then why was it the first thing you mentioned?”

“He always talked about the moon as if he was worried it was going to disappear out of the sky.”

~~~

As Klaus went back to the hotel to pack and check out, he couldn’t help but think about how easy it was to convince Vanya. He thought for sure it’d be harder than that. She didn’t even ask to see his powers. There were Russian ghosts everywhere, looking at him with somber eyes. It would’ve been easy to conjure her an army, but no, Vanya took him at his word. He supposed it was a stroke of luck (which they needed, especially Five). “You know what they say. Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth,” he thought.

It’s lonely to not have a family. During the period between him quitting and finding his footing in life, Klaus was one of the lonliest people in the world. The drugs were a dark, dark time, but this was a different kind of dark. No friends, not even bad ones, and struggling to find ways to cope and stay clean. Enrico was there from time to time, but one dead friend does not a support system make. School, work, Aaron, and Aaron’s friends finally gave him a normal life, and a happy one. Aaron was his family, and these new people didn’t change that. But still, it was nice to find his relatives, even if they weren’t technically related.

Klaus didn’t know what Vanya’s situation was here, when it came to friends and family. There’s the orchestra, of course, but outside of that, who knows? She didn’t exactly seem like the most social person ever, and the lasting effects of her childhood may have played a role in her ability to socialize.

The pair met at the entrance to the hotel and took a cab to the airport, where they bought tickets for a 10pm flight on the credit card Pogo gave him. They had time to eat dinner and bum around the airport a bit before the flight.

“So, tell me about our other siblings,” Vanya said over dinner.

“Well, Five and Diego are the ones I know the best. Five is… well, a bit of an asshole, but he’s really a good kid. I mean, he’s not a kid, but… you know. I’m just a little worried he’s overextending himself over this whole apocalypse thing.”

“Shouldn’t all of us?”

“I never see him eat. Or sleep. I’m not sure that he does. That can’t be good for him.”

Vanya shrugged. “Frankly it’s odd you’re not as concerned and are able to sit here and eat that chicken sandwich.”

Klaus took a bite of his sandwich. “Can’t conjure ghosts with an empty stomach,” he replied with his mouth full. “I’ve tried.”

“Ok, and Diego?”

“I like him. He’s probably a bit too self reliant, but he’s got a good heart. Ben is a bit… introverted but I don’t think he’s that bad. I don’t like Allison very much. She tried to use her powers on Five when we went to recruit her.”

“What are her powers?”

“She can rumor anyone to do anything… except get rid of our amnesia, I guess. Five looked absolutely terrified of her.”

“And she was trying to…?”

“Rumor him to leave her alone. Make him forget about her or something. It’s kind of gross, you know? Superseding someone’s free will and all that?”

Vanya nodded. “So all that’s left is Luther. The strong one.”

“Yeah, I think Diego and Five are working on recruiting him too.”

“Hm. Well, it will be interesting to meet you all.”

Klaus let out a laugh. “Yeah. We’re quite a bunch.”

~~~

Five went back to the secret room behind the anechoic chamber and cursed himself for never learning lockpicking (when you can teleport anywhere, it’s not usually necessary). The cabinet Diego had found the moon stuff in had re-locked itself when he closed it. Most stuff in the apocalypse could be opened by banging on it or breaking it open with a crowbar. Five didn’t have a crowbar and these cabinets were still completely sturdy: not rusty or crumbly at all.

He sighed, and gave it a thought. What was he supposed to do about the moon anyways? The only one who knew how to fly a rocket was a Luther that was long forgotten (and even the spaceship he used was mainly controlled from the ground by a team of scientists). And he didn’t even have a rocket. And he didn’t know the first thing he’d do on the moon.

His siblings would all be here very, very soon, and Five had nothing to give them. He punched the cabinet, and he groaned a bit, the searing pain radiating from his knuckles up his arm.

He paced around the small room and thought about his conversation with Diego yesterday. If the amnesia hadn’t happened, he would’ve come back and collected his siblings and attempted to stop the apocalypse, which he failed at. What information did he really have about this aborted timeline?

Did he have to separate his siblings? Send them to the corners of the Earth? Five thought it might be plausible, but it was also self-centered. Who’s to say they’re related to the cause at all?

Besides, what could he do now? Klaus was coming with Vanya no matter what. Everyone else was ready to gather and fight, except Luther. What was he gonna do, not get Luther? Tell everyone “never mind, the Umbrella Academy is off, go home”? That’s a surefire way to make six people with superpowers pissed off (especially since two of the most powerful ones are an unstable man who’s murdered before and a ruthless businesswoman).

That got Five thinking about how the Umbrella Academy themselves were different. The Handler wasn’t entirely wrong about that. The paths of their lives were irrevocably changed forever when dad erased their minds, and they all probably wound up in very different places because of it. Did Klaus get clean in the other timeline? Possibly not. Which means there was a good chance that original-timeline Klaus couldn’t summon dad for Five to interview. Suddenly Five was hit with the biggest, dumbest eureka moment of his life. Klaus’s powers. His power upgrades could come in very handy after all. Once he got back, Five could get him to summon dad, and have him tell them the cause of the apocalypse once and for all.

That was plan B, next to getting back to the Commission somehow (plan A).

~~~

When Diego arrived that afternoon, Five updated him on all the news and pestered him as he picked the lock again for the cabinet with info on the moon.

“I don’t know what I’d be doing Five!” Diego said. “How am I supposed to know what an alternate version of me would be doing in a timeline where I never got amnesia?”

“Because you’re still him, you idiot!”

“Yeah, but I don’t know him. You’re the only one who knows about this version of Diego.”

“He’s you! Just a bit younger and louder and more obnoxious.”

“That’s incredibly unhelpful.”

“Yeah, and how are you helping stop the apocalypse in four days?!”

Diego slammed the cabinet and turned around.

“I’m here, opening this goddamn cabinet for you to look at stupid moon stuff. I got you out of prison and I’m throwing the cops off your tracks. Haven’t you wondered why they haven’t arrested you by now? I’ve sent them on a wild goose chase up north to Canada! I’m here, dealing with you, and stalking some random guy’s apartment! Do you want my help or not?!”

Five was, of course, reminded of his fight with Pogo earlier that day. Well, he didn’t want to repeat that. He looked at the floor.

“I’m sorry, Diego,” he said. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

“I forgive you,” Diego replied as he turned back to the cabinet, “and I’m sorry for yelling back.”

Five nodded awkwardly to acknowledge the apology, and Diego cracked open the filing cabinet, and started removing documents that were involved with the moon. Five cleared a space on the desk and took the documents and started rifling through them.

“What the hell is this?” Five asked.

“What do you mean?”

“Half of this shit is incomprehensible code.”

Diego opened up the file he was currently holding. The first page was written in English, and the rest was written in symbols he didn’t recognize.

“Some of them match the symbols on the keypad,” Five said, looking between it and the pages in front of him.”

Diego looked up at the keypad. “Oh yeah. This must be really secretive if Hargreeves wouldn’t write it in English.”

“Well, it’s not entirely pointless to look through this,” Five said, unfolding some architectural drawings. “What do you think this is? An apartment building? No, a hotel.”

Diego leaned over. “Yeah, it kinda looks like a hotel.”

“What’s a hotel blueprint doing in a file on the moon?”

“Did Hargreeves even own hotels?”

“Not when I knew him. But 17 years is a lot of time. He could’ve gotten into the business after I ran away.”

“I don’t recall him being in the hotel business, but I didn’t really care what he did.”

“Never mind,” Five said, “This file is a hundred years old.”

“What? Why does he have it? He was only… how old was he when he died?”

Five furrowed his brow. “I’m… not sure…”

“You don’t know how old your dad was?”

“He wasn’t exactly the type to celebrate birthdays.”

Diego shrugged. “It probably belonged to his father and got passed down to him.”

“Yeah, probably.”

They continued to look through the documents, but the only parts in English were stuff from Luther’s moon mission, and then stuff about the Mercury and Apollo missions in the 1960s.

They went back upstairs and Five paced around and got some fresh air.

“What happened here?” Diego asked, pointing at the destroyed paintings.

“Mom threw them over the ledge-- mom!” Five said. “I’ve got to introduce you to mom!”

“The robot?”

“Yes.”

Grace came down the steps as if she knew she’d been called, and when she set eyes on Diego, Five saw her eyes crinkle and the corners of her lips rise.

“Diego,” she said, swiftly rushing forward to hug him.

“Hi, uh… mom,” Diego said, slowly hugging her back. “This is, uh, awkward.”

“I am so sorry,” Grace said, stepping back. “I just haven’t seen you in 12 years.”

Diego was completely lost for words. “Well… I’ve never had a mom before.”

Grace smiled and laughed a bit. “Well now you do.”

“Huh… uh… ok,” Diego said with a small smile.

Five felt kind of bad for not preparing him for this at all. Of course this is beyond strange for him.

“Klaus and Vanya will be coming tomorrow, and then everyone else after that,” Five said to break the awkward silence. “You’ll get to see everyone again.”

Grace’s face lit up like it never had before. “Well I guess I better start preparing,” she said joyfully. She gave Diego a kiss on the forehead which made him beam bright red, ruffled Five’s hair which made him a bit mad, and went off.

Five fixed his hair.

“So uh, what’s the plan with stopping the apocalypse?” Diego asked.

“When Klaus gets back I’m going to get him to contact dad. If that isn’t helpful I’m going to try and contact the Commission and figure out the cause myself.”

“How can the rest of us be helpful in all that?”

“Well when I’m talking to dad you can all be quiet, and after that I don’t know. But there will be something for you to do, I’m sure of it.”

Diego nodded. “Ok then.”

“Right now we need to get Luther. I’m done waiting for him to show up. We need to find him, wherever he is, and bring him home. The schedule of his circus should be public knowledge, right? We should be able to find where he is.”

“Let’s try his apartment one last time and see if he’s there. If not, we can go to the library and ask about the circus thing.”

Five nodded. “Sounds like a plan.”

Chapter Text

As Klaus and Vanya flew back to America, Five and Diego drove to Henry Mellcot’s apartment. When they got there, they found two men unloading an SUV in the parking lot. One was an unassuming average height man with brown hair, and the other was an incredibly tall and incredibly big man with short blonde hair. Diego and Five parked across from them, and walked up to them.

“Uh, can we help you?” the brunette man asked.

“Are you Luther de Luna?” Five asked the big one. He looked confused.

“Uh, yeah? Who are you?”

“We’re your family.”

Somehow Luther’s look of confusion grew more intense.

“Could you excuse us for a moment?” Diego asked Mellcot.

“Are you okay, Luther?” Henry asked him.

“I don’t have a family,” Luther said.

“We know. You have amnesia. You woke up with 17 only remembering your name,” Five said, tired of having gone over this three times already.

“Wait, how do you know that?” Luther asked.

“I’ll explain in a moment,” Five said, giving Henry the side-eye.

“Yeah, uh, you can take that upstairs, I guess,” Luther said to Henry, pointing at some boxes.

“Ok…” Henry said, leaving.

Five and Diego gave Luther the spiel, and reluctantly showed their powers when Luther demanded it (while no one was looking).

“Wow, okay,” Luther said at the end of it.

“I know it’s a lot to process,” Diego said.

“I’m sorry we got in contact with you last, Luther,” Five said, seemingly telling the truth. “Because we only have 4 days to save the world.”

“This is a lot to process,” Luther echoed.

“Do you wanna sit?” Diego asked.

Luther nodded, and sat on the curb.

“What happened to you?” Five asked, eyeing his proportions.

“What do you mean?” Luther asked, looking up.

“I mean you were… always kind of lanky as a kid,” Five said. “Maybe you grew out of it.”

“No, it’s not that,” he said, looking back down again.

“What… what is it?”

Luther didn’t respond.

“Five, we’re strangers, remember? If he doesn’t want to answer, he doesn’t have to,” Diego said.

Five nodded slightly, in acknowledgement. On the inside his mind was buzzing. Maybe this was the catalyst for Reggie’s second mind wipe.

“Look, are ya in?” Diego asked. “We could use a big guy.”

“I don’t really have a choice, do I?” Luther asked.

Diego and Five looked at each other. He did have a choice, of course (they weren’t going to kidnap him, well Diego wasn’t, and Five figured it might be difficult to kidnap someone over twice his size), but neither of them wanted to risk not getting him in.

“I mean, we all have a choice, don’t we?” Five asked.

Luther contemplated this for a few more moments in silence, then he looked up.

“You know what? What the hell. I’m in. I’ve always wondered who my family is,” Luther said, with a little smile.

~~~

Klaus was initially worried that the flight back home would be painfully awkward, and that he’d have to make conversation with a stranger for hours on end, but (luckily?) they couldn’t get seats together since they bought their tickets at the last minute, so Klaus ended up sitting in the middle seat between two actual strangers, but at least he didn’t feel socially compelled to talk to them.

When he got up to use the restroom, he passed Vanya and saw her dozing. She’d been all over the world thanks to her orchestra, and she had probably mastered sleeping on planes and trains and buses. Klaus wished he could be that lucky.

When they landed back in America, Klaus resolved to ask Five more about his past. The kid hadn’t really told him anything about their childhood, and Klaus figured that they were probably from the times before he could remember. The drugs had knocked out parts of his memories post-wipe, but the nightmares were always there. The question was if Five would know the source of them or not, given Reginald’s aptitude for secrecy.

~~~

Five and Diego helped Luther unpack his things (which wasn’t that much) and Luther explained to Henry that they’re his brothers, which Henry tentatively accepted, and then Diego drove the two back to the hotel.

“Once Klaus and Vanya are back, I’m going to get Allison and Ben. And then we’ll all be here,” Five said in the car, partially to Diego and Luther but partially to himself.

“Sounds like a plan,” Diego said.

“Yeah, what is the plan, exactly? To stop the apocalypse?” Luther asked, leaning forward and making the car lurch.

“Why does everyone keep asking that?!” Five cried.

“In fairness… that’s kind of important,” Diego said under his breath.

“Do you guys not have a plan?”

“I have some plans… they just don’t involve everyone yet,” Five said with gritted teeth.

“Ok… and they are?”

“Well the first plan is to get one of our other brothers, Klaus, to summon dad. He can summon ghosts and stuff. The second one involves me going back to the Commission.”

“The Commission?”

“Time agency I worked at for a bit.”

Luther definitely had more questions, but the vibes in the car said to shut up. “Okey dokey.”

The three went up to the hotel suite and Luther let out a whistle. “This is a nice room.”

“Hargreeves’s is paying for it,” Five deadpanned.

“Why didn’t we go to his mansion?”

“The butler is kinda mad at me right now. I’d prefer not to anger him any further.”

“Alright…”

~~~

Klaus and Vanya debarked the plane, went through customs separately, and met up again by bag pick up. It was 10am, with 3 days left to go.

“Welp, that was miserable,” Klaus said. “I hope I never have to take two flights in one day again in my life.”

“Well we should probably stop the apocalypse first before you worry about that,” Vanya said with an American accent. Klaus’s jaw dropped.

“So you were faking it!”

“No, I’m faking this one. I know what America is like. Why should I stand out when I can do a perfect American accent?”

Klaus wasn’t sure what to believe. “Sure, I guess…”

Klaus hailed a cab and they went to the new hotel, checked in, and found a huge blonde guy sitting on the couch watching TV with Diego, and Five in the kitchenette drinking coffee.

“Hey Five,” Klaus said.

“Oh wow, you came back fast,” Five responded. “You look like death.”

“I don’t know how many hours it’s been since I slept properly,” Klaus said with a self-deprecating chuckle.

“Hi,” Vanya said. “I’m Vanya.”

“I’m Luther,” the big blonde guy said, getting up. “Nice to meet you both.”

They shook hands, and Klaus noticed that Luther’s handshake was especially gentle. He remembered that Five said he was the strong guy. Klaus wondered if he broke anyone’s hands before he corrected his handshake. Waking up with super strength wasn’t as bad as him or Ben, but it was still probably a challenge.

“Klaus, do you think you could summon dad now?” Five asked him.

“I don’t know,” Klaus moaned. “It’s always harder if I don’t know them or if they’re not in the room already. And like I said I barely slept on the plane both ways and had a tiny nap at my hotel.”

“Then go get some sleep,” Five said. “You’re no use to me like this.”

“Gladly,” Klaus said, going into a room, shutting the door, and falling onto one of the beds.

“Hey, I’m Diego, by the way,” Diego said, getting up to greet Vanya. “Nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you all too,” Vanya replied, tensing up a bit. “Let me, uh, settle in.”

“Course.”

Vanya picked an empty room and went in.

“She seems a bit overwhelmed,” Diego said.

“No shit, Sherlock. She just traveled over a thousand miles and met a bunch of strangers and is now in a hotel with them. I wouldn’t be surprised if she was feeling some anxiety,” Five said, taking a sip from his coffee. “Also the world ends in 3 days. That doesn’t help.”

“I wish there was a way to make her feel better,” Luther said. “Are there any good Russian places in town?”

Diego and Five looked at each other, and both shrugged.

~~~

Vanya put her suitcase on the chair and sat down on one of the beds and took a few deep breaths. Never before had what she’d been doing been so real to her. Here she was, in America, with her family, three days before the end of the world. It was a bit terrifying being in a hotel room with all these strange men. Even Five was scary. Klaus had told her he was a time traveling assassin, and that made him worth fearing even in his current body. But she knew she was more powerful than all of them.

~~~

“Alright,” Five said, “Time to go get Allison.”

“What about the last one?”

“Ben? Klaus said he was in a fragile state of mind, and you two don’t exactly look super cuddly. In my opinion we wait for Klaus to get him later, maybe even after he’s contacted dad. Now’s the time to go to Ventus Inc’s head office.”

Diego sighed and grabbed his keys. “Someone else in this family needs to get a fucking car.”

“Based on Allison’s success in life, she probably has several.”

~~~

Five directed Diego to Allison’s offices, they parked, and walked into the building.

Luther let out a low whistle while looking around the fancy entrance. “Why weren’t all of us this successful?” he asked no one in particular.

“Allison does have a distinct advantage,” Five said, either not realizing it was a rhetorical question, or ignoring that fact.

“We’re the Geists, here to see Allison,” Five said to the lady at the front desk.

She looked at the three of them. “Head on up. I’ll tell her you’re coming.”

“I thought we were the Hargreeveses,” Luther whispered as they walked away.

“Geist is a more discrete last name,” Five replied, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. He did not miss having to over-explain everything for Luther, although it did bring back fond (well maybe that wasn’t the right word, but Five couldn’t think of another one) memories of pre-mission panic questions about the plan.

They went to the top floor, walked to Allison’s office, and knocked on the door.

“Five? Is that you?” Allison asked from behind the door.

“Yeah.”

“Come on in.”

Five opened the door, and the trio walked in, and for the first time in 12 years, Luther and Allison laid eyes on each other. Five saw the recognition in Allison’s eyes (he was standing in front of Luther and couldn’t see his) and he knew bringing the big guy was worth it. Allison and Luther were the closest as kids. Everyone knew they had an unbreakable bond. Five was banking on dear old dad not being able to break it, and it looked like he was right.

“You two must be Luther and Diego,” Allison said, quickly regaining her composure. Five wondered if seeing him and feeling that recognition startled her a bit, but being Allison she got over it quickly. Five didn’t have to look at Luther to know he would not.

“Hi, nice to meet you,” Diego said.

“Yeah, nice to meet you,” Luther added.

“We’re all here now,” Five interjected. “It’s time to come and meet everyone.”

Allison sighed, looked at her computer, looked at Luther, and then back at Five.

“Let me shoot my secretary an email that I’ll be out the next--?”

“Three days, tops.”

“--and then I guess I can go.”

“Great, we’ll meet you at the car.”

Allison gave him a funny look, “Five, I have my own car.”

“Oh, right,” He gave her the address and then the boys left.

As soon as they got out into the elevator, Diego turned to Luther and immediately ripped into him.

“What the hell were those eyes you were giving her?” He said, unable to hide a smirk.

“What eyes??” Luther asked. Five couldn’t tell if he was genuinely clueless or was feigning it.

“They were close as kids, probably the closest out of all of us,” Five said. “I had an idea that dad’s memory wipe couldn’t erase that completely, which is why I brought you along.” And he left his explanation at that, and it seemed to appease Luther and Diego.

They drove back to the hotel. In the parking lot they saw Allison come out of a shiny black mercedes. Luther let out a whistle.

“Well that’s what you get when you become an entrepreneur instead of a clown,” Diego said.

“First of all, I’m not a clown, and even if I was, clowns are some of the best people I know.” Luther replied, “Also, Diego, you drive a 20-year-old Honda Civic.”

“Is it bad if I say I missed this?” Five said, but not really to either of them.

“Missed what?” Diego asked.

“Never mind.”

“What are you boys standing around for? Don’t we have a world to save or something?” Allison said, walking up to them.

“Yeah, uh, let’s introduce you to Vanya,” Five said, hesitant to bring up the fact that Ben wasn’t actually here yet.

They went up to the suite and Five went to wake Klaus up.

“Five-uh… it’s been like, an hour…” Klaus moaned, shifting away from Five.

“Yeah well, Allison is here now, time to go.”

“So what? Ben isn’t.”

“Well--”

Klaus suddenly sat up and looked at him. “Are you scared of Allison?”

“No.”

“I’ve had teens lie to me before, Five.”

“I’m not a teenager.”

“Yeah, well, you look like one.”

“You know what I also look like? The deadliest assassin in the space time continuum. I’m not scared of some businesswoman who is also my sister.”

“Yeah, whatever. Look can I at least shower and eat first?”

“Ugh!”

“I’m telling you, this’ll go a lot better if I’m in a good state of mind. Do your powers work well when you’re running on nothing?”

Five made another loud and annoying sigh. “Be FAST, for christsake…”

Out in the living area the other four were chatting and getting to know each other and Five explained the Klaus situation as he jumped in the shower.

“Maybe we could order a room service or something,” Diego said. “Lunch and a seance.”

Luther laughed and Allison let out a small snort.

“I don’t care,” Five replied, brewing himself a cup of the coffee that comes in the room. So they ordered some food (Klaus yelled his order from the bathroom) and Five made them eat as fast as possible so they could get on already (he also offered Klaus a cup of coffee, which he refused).

“Let’s move everything out of the way,” Klaus said, gesturing to the living room.

“Why? You’re gonna need a lot of space?” Allison asked, somewhat nervous again.

“Not usually, but sometimes. Like I said, it’s harder when it’s someone I don’t have a spiritual connection with and or their ghost isn’t physically present. With Hargreeves, I have neither element on my side.”

“But you do have a connection with him,” Five said, as Luther and Diego pushed the chair, couch, and table to the walls. “I wouldn’t exactly call it ‘spiritual,’ but…”

Klaus thought this over. “I’ve never summoned anyone I knew before the amnesia… that I know of… maybe that connection will make it easier.”

“Or harder,” Five said into his second cup of coffee.

“Ok, everyone stand back,” Klaus said, just a hint of nervousness in his voice. Five wondered if he’d ever summoned a ghost in front of so many people before. But Klaus never had stage fright. Not the Klaus he knew.

The young man’s fists glowed blue and everyone watched in awe for something to happen. After a few moments, Vanya piped up.

“Are we supposed to… see something?” she asked.

“Yes,” Allison responded, before Five could.

Klaus tried harder, and then released. “Ugh! It’s difficult when I can’t get a reading on their energy,” then his eyes lit up. “What if we go to the mansion! It might make it easier. That place is practically dripping with Hargreeves’s personality and energy. His ghost might even be looming around there.”

Everyone looked at Five.

“I guess Pogo can’t stay mad at me forever.”

Chapter Text

The gang split up between Diego and Allison’s cars and drove to the mansion (Diego, Five, and Luther in one car and Allison, Klaus, and Vanya in the other).

“Do you really think this is gonna work?” Diego asked. “I’ve always thought all this hippy mumbo-jumbo spiritual-connection stuff was bogus.”

“If it was coming out of anyone else’s mouth I’d feel the same way,” Five replied. “But you can direct bullets with your mind and a strongman here can punch a hole through concrete.”

“I can??” Luther asked. “I’ve gotta incorporate that into my act.”

Meanwhile, things were more awkward in the other car.

“So… Allison… ever been to the Hargreeves’ mansion?” Klaus asked, leaning on the front seats from the back.

“No. Why would I?”

“I dunno, you’re a rich businesswoman, he’s a rich businessman…”

“We ran in different circles,” Allison said tartly. “New money versus old money. Millions versus billions. Besides, wouldn’t he try to avoid me?”

“Ah, yeah, probably,” Klaus agreed.

“So what is it you do, Klaus?” Vanya asked.

“I’m a therapist.”

“Interesting.”

There was an awkward silence.

“Well I’m glad to know Hargreeves taught us all social skills,” Klaus quipped.

Vanya let out a loud laugh, and even Allison chuckled.

“You were the first to know, right?” Vanya asked.

“Yeah, I’m the first Five contacted, out of pure luck.”

“What was that like?”

Klaus smiled and sighed. “Well to be honest it didn’t go great. He kinda freaked me out.”

“Oh, like this didn’t freak us all out,” Allison said.

“I’m sure it did Mrs. Almost-turned-my-powers-on-my-brother,” Klaus taunted.

“Wouldja let that go already?”

“Sure, I’ll let it go. Once you’ve made sure each of Walter Abel’s great-grandkids can go to Harvard and Harvard Law, and then Monaco every summer.”

Allison grumbled. “I’m working on that.”

“Who is Walter Abel?” Vanya asked.

From the back seat, Klaus could see Allison’s shoulders tense.

“Someone Allison owes a life debt to,” Klaus replied.

“Okay…”

“Oh look, here we are, the Hargreeves’ mansion,” Allison said, pulling into a parking spot out front.

The six walked up to the front door and Five knocked. After a few moments, Pogo answered, first looking at Five with a neutral face, and then up at the gaggle of adults behind him.

“Welcome, everyone,” Pogo said, letting them into the house. Luther and Vanya looked around in awe, and Allison looked around. Five pulled Pogo aside.

“Look…” he said, “I’m sorry about our argument.”

Pogo sighed. “I’m sorry too, Master Five.”

“We’re going to try and get Klaus to summon Reg. He thinks being in a space with a lot of dad’s… energy, or whatever, will help him.”

“Where were you thinking of doing it?”

“How’s his office?”

Pogo pursed his lips. “Still a bit of a mess, to be honest.”

“The living room, then.”

“That would be a good place.”

Five turned to usher everyone into the living room, but Pogo didn’t follow.

“Don’t you want to see him?” Five asked, once everyone was inside and clearing a space for Klaus.

“No, Master Five, I do not,” Pogo said. “Good luck.”

“Thanks.”

Five turned with a shrug and followed his family inside.

Five found a small argument happening inside.

“This is silly,” he heard Vanya say, as Luther was lifting a couch. “I can move everything by myself.”

Luther, Diego, and Allison exchanged glances (Klaus was standing over by the bar, doing his own thing). Their combined extra height over Vanya would probably make for a healthy three-year-old.

“Ohhhhh, with the powers,” Diego said.

Five’s interest in this conversation suddenly grew by several times.

“Yes, with my powers,” Vanya said indignantly. “It is nice not to have to hide them for once. Stand back everyone!”

Luther put the couch down and everyone took a step back. Vanya hummed a note and started to glow, and all the furniture in the room rose up, along with her. Five even felt himself being pulled up a bit.

Like an expert conductor, Vanya directed the furniture pieces around the room, expertly piled in the corner like a game of tetris, and none looked on with more awe than Five.

Then she came back to the ground and the glow ended.

“Why didn’t you help back at the hotel?” Diego asked. Leave it to him to bring up that of all things.

“That was just a few things. It would’ve taken forever to move everything manually here.”

And with that, Five’s interest in those four dwindled, and he went over to Klaus.

“Are you ready?”

“I’m just trying to absorb everything I can about him here. Is there anything I should know about him?”

“Well, he was always a stubborn bastard. He may try to resist you.”

“What would persuade him to come out?”

Five’s fists tightened. He’d spent so long trying to ignore Reggie’s wants, living his life as if to say “I don’t care what you think of me!” It was his way of dealing with the painful reality.

Klaus saw the look on Five’s face, and his own softened. “Never mind, I’ll figure it out.”

He turned, and walked to the middle of the now empty room. He’d seen narcissistic parents before, and knew the ins and outs of NPD as per the DSM-V and life experience with clients. Even if he didn’t know Reggie personally, that look on Five’s face unfortunately told him all he needed to know. The fact that six of them were together, with one on standby, against all odds, that was the reason. The Umbrella Academy had come together again despite his tries to separate them. Klaus didn’t know if he’d be pissed or smug or surprised, but he’d definitely feel something about it, and that was reason enough to come back to the world of the living.

“C’mon…” Klaus said to himself as he assumed his summoning position and clenched his fists. He could feel Sir Reginald Hargreeves all around him, his energy seeping off the walls, before it congealed into a soul, he looked up and saw the face he vaguely recognized on the news standing in front of them, glowing blue.

“Well I must say I’m impressed,” Reginald’s ghost said. “All of this with three days to spare.”

Klaus felt his gut drop and a chill go down his spine. He didn’t remember this man as anything other than a public figure, but something in his brain did. Something in him never forgot. His body never forgot. He turned to look behind him, and saw the same looks on his sibling’s faces. Despite looking nothing alike, they all looked related right now. If Klaus had any remaining doubts about them actually, truly being a family, they vanished at that moment. To varying degrees, they pulled themselves together, and Five took a step forward.

“Hi, dad…” Five said.

“Hello, Number Five,” Reginald replied. “I assume this is your doing.”

“Yes, it is. I collected my siblings and now I’m trying to stop the apocalypse.”

“You’re missing one. Number Six.”

“I know. He’s-- we’re getting him next. I wanted to contact you as soon as possible.”

“Number Six?” Klaus asked himself. Cogs started turning in his mind.

“Very well. What did you contact me for?”

“To stop the apocalypse, obviously,” Five said. “You know about it.”

“Well of course I know about it. But I can’t help you stop it.”

“Why not?”

“Too many variables. Even if you knew everything there is to know about right now, you could not predict what would happen next.”

“But you said ‘with three days to spare.’ You know it happens in three days.”

“That was my estimate, yes.”

“Well it’s not an estimate. It’s the truth. I know that for a fact.”

“Fascinating.”

Suddenly Diego piped up from the back. “Five, is this going anywhere?”

Five turned to him with utter annoyance on his face. “Didn’t I tell you to let me handle dad?”

“Yeah, well, your approach doesn’t really seem to be helping.”

“Number Two… forever trying to take the lead,” Reggie said with a sigh.

“Oh yeah, and what the hell is with the number stuff?” Diego asked. “Who’s Number Two?”

“You are,” Klaus said slowly, “He didn’t name us.”

“No, he didn’t,” Five said. “But that’s not important either right now--”

“Hold on, hold on,” Allison said, “You were just gonna keep from us that Hargreeves didn’t give us names?”

“That is pretty weird,” Luther added.

“Jesus FUCKING Christ,” Five said, exasperated. “I’m sorry I didn’t have time to get into all the family secrets! I was kind of busy!”

“I take back what I said earlier,” Reginald interrupted. “I’m not impressed. Clearly you got this far only with luck on your side. You are still, unfortunately, an undisciplined pack of children. My chosen leader has relegated himself to the background and clownery, and you all clearly have no idea what you’re doing--”

“SHUT UP!” Vanya yelled. Reginald looked genuinely taken aback. “Five, did we really let him go on like that as kids?”

Five didn’t have to reply to answer her.

She walked past everyone, right up to Reginald. “You tell us everything you know about the apocalypse right now.” She managed to actually be a little intimidating.

“The second surprise of the day…” Reginald said, echoing the thoughts of everyone else in the room. “Unfortunately, I am telling the truth.”

“What about the moon?” Five asked.

“The moon? Unrelated.”

Five took a moment to contemplate this.

“Five?” Klaus asked, “I’m not sure how much longer I can hold him here.”

“It’s-- I--” Five said, at a loss for words.

“What is he made of right now?” Vanya asked Klaus.

“Made of? I dunno, he’s a ghost.”

“I want to try something.”

“What do you want to try?” Five asked.

“Well if he’s physically here in any way at all, maybe I can affect him.”

“The hell does that mean?”

Vanya hummed and started glowing again, she held her hands out in front of her and the air where Reginald was warbled. He watched, unimpressed, putting his hands in his pockets. Vanya grew frustrated, and a beam of white light shot out from her chest, through Reginald, exploding the bar. He was entirely unaffected.

“Woah, Vanya, what the hell!” Five cried, “stop!”

“Five, I’m letting go!” Klaus said, panting, “If you got anything to ask, ask it now!”

Five looked at his father, mouth agape. And then he turned when he heard heels clicking behind him. Grace marched past her children and went straight to Reginald. Even Vanya got out of the way for her.

“Grace,” Reginald said, a lilt of surprise in his voice.

“Five gave me my memories back.”

“Oh,” Reginald said. Nobody in the room could tell what that “oh” meant.

“Mrs. Hargreeves, Grace, I can’t hold on much longer!” Klaus said.

“Then I’ll keep it short,” Grace said curtly. “I hope you are, as people say, ‘burning in hell.’”

“Mm,” Reginald said to Grace, before turning to Five. “This has been utterly disappointing.” And with that, he faded away, and Klaus flopped down on the ground, breathing heavily.

“Well, that was about as helpful as everything else we’ve tried,” Diego said. “What’s your next plan, the Commission or something?”

Five looked at his siblings and vanished.

~~~

Five paced around in the alley by the dumpster behind the Academy.

“Why did I want to contact him? Why did I think that would help?!” he grumbled to himself. He desperately did not want to think about his father, so he shifted his focus somewhere else. To someone else.

Vanya.

Something was up with her.

Five suddenly heard a window being opened, and Klaus stuck his torso out. “FIVE!!!” he yelled, looking around and missing him. Five contemplated whether or not to reply, but then Klaus looked down, and climbed out the window down the ladder and dropped to the ground.

“Are you okay?”

“Do I need to answer, Mr. Therapist?”

Klaus rolled his eyes a little bit. “Well… obviously that was tough for you. I mean, he erased my mind and I still got the heebie-jeebies.”

“No wonder,” Five said, looking away.

“By the way… I was meaning to ask you…” Klaus paused, “I get nightmares, sometimes. Stone walls closing in on me, people screaming my name, stuff like that. I’m always in the body of a child when it happens.”

Five nodded a tiny bit, almost involuntarily.

“I was wondering if you knew why…”

Five bit his lip, and then sighed. “Training. We each had training. It wasn’t always pleasant, you had it the worst.”

“What aren’t you telling us?”

Five suddenly looked him straight in the eyes. “He locked you in a mausoleum for hours, multiple times. You were inconsolable when you came back.”

Klaus was aghast. “That’s child abuse.”

“No shit, but what could we do about it? He had all the power, we had none.”

Klaus felt strangely emotional, emotions his brain wasn’t ready to understand. But there was also a rational voice inside him, one which had grown quite a bit since he got clean, and was sharpened by education. Trauma leaves a lasting impact on the brain. Reginald erased their minds, but you can’t erase trauma. No wonder everyone was so taken aback by the “stranger,” something in them knew he wasn’t foreign.

“Look,” he said, changing the subject, “Everyone’s looking for you, people are arguing, Grace is upset… come back inside. Let’s go get Ben! Let’s figure this out!”

“Figure what out, Klaus?!” Five exploded. “Dad was as useless as a sack of bricks!”

“You said you could go back to the Commission!”

“Three days! It’s probably too late to change anything now.”

“A lot can happen in three days.”

“Oh don’t you start.”

“You can’t give up now.”

Five froze up, and Klaus noticed he was shaking a bit. Klaus softly put his hand on Five’s shoulder, and he could feel the tension relax just a bit.

“I’m not gonna give up,” Klaus added.

“You love giving up. You gave up all the time,” Five said quietly.

“Well I’m not that kid anymore.”

“It’s hopeless… I’m literally just one person.”

“Yeah, but you’ve got six more on your side. I didn’t literally drag myself out of the gutter just to die less than a decade later, Five. We gotta fight this!”

“We have been fighting it! We’ve been fighting it for five days and we’re no closer to solving it!”

“Don’t. Listen. To. Your. Father,” Klaus said slowly. “What you’ve done these past few days has been incredibly impressive. You collected all of us and learned the source of our amnesia. And you’re so close to cracking the cause of the apocalypse. I can feel it.”

Five didn’t respond.

“Look at me,” Klaus said. Five turned around, and Klaus put his hands on Five’s shoulders.

“What?” Five said, dejectedly. Klaus’s face faltered for a moment, seemingly not being able to bring the right words to his lips, and then he grew more confident, bent down, and hugged him.

Five was beyond startled, and froze for a second, before slowly returning the hug, if not as tightly as Klaus was hugging him.

“You’re my brother and I love you,” Klaus said. “And I just met you and I’m not letting you go.”

“If you want to save the world you kind of have to.”

“You know that’s not what I mean.” Klaus gave him one final squeeze and letting him go.

“Let’s go back inside, huh?” Klaus said. He wasn’t sure, but he thought Five looked like he might be tearing up. “You need a moment?”

“No, no. Let’s go back inside. Let’s solve this.”

Chapter Text

When they went back inside the first thing Five was met with was:

“I TOLD YOU I’M NOT A FREAKIN’ CLOWN!”

“Jesus Christ,” he said to himself before blinking up onto a table. “Hey! Everyone!”

The side conversations stopped and everyone looked at him.

“Where the hell did you disappear to?” Diego asked, stepping forward.

“I just--”

“He needed a breather,” Klaus interrupted.

“Yeah,” Five said, before pausing and taking a breath. “Unfortunately dad was unhelpful, so now I need to get to the Commission before it’s too late.”

“What are we gonna do?” Vanya asked.

“I want you monitoring the news. Diego, North and South America. Allison, Europe. Luther, Asia. Vanya, Africa and Australia. Work together, look for patterns. Anything out of the ordinary, either natural or man-made. Strange weather, tensions increasing between countries, anything political really. Go to the library, scour the television networks. Allison, if you have any inside resources in that department, then be helpful. Klaus, you’re going to go get Ben and then come back and help. Everyone understand?”

“Five, what can I do?” Grace asked.

“You're our point man on Reginald,” Five said, coming down from the desk. “Find anything he had that could be helpful. You can plug yourself into his computer,” Five snapped his fingers, “Oh! And maybe you can decode some papers for us, I’ll be right back!”

He blinked down to the secret office and brought back the file on that hotel he and Diego found, and then he and Klaus headed out on their missions.

“Klaus, I have a special mission for you,” Five said, once the front door was shut.

“Hm?”

“I want you to watch Vanya.”

“What do you mean? Why does she need watching?”

“Something is up with her. She acted… very out of character during the seance.”

“Maybe she’s just grown up.”

“I don’t think that’s it. I could be wrong, I hope I’m wrong, but I don’t know. The rest of you all seem like the same person I knew all those years ago. Vanya is so much different.”

Klaus nodded. “Okay.”

“Don’t tell any of the others. And try and help everyone get along as much as you can.”

“Sir yes sir,” Klaus said with a sarcastic salute. Five rolled his eyes.

~~~

Five went back to the motel he first stayed in when he arrived in 2019, and went around back to the dumpsters.

“Handler!!” he cried, pacing around. “Handler! AJ! Anyone???” He called out. “I know you’re watching…” he said under his breath. Then he felt it, time slowing.

“Hello Five,” The Handler said.

“Thank God,” Five said. “I’ve been thinking about what you’ve said… I’ve decided I want in. I want to see my siblings again. MY siblings. I’ll do whatever it takes to see them.”

The Handler laughed. “Seriously, Five? You’re right, you know, we have been watching you. What makes you think we’d let you back into the Commission now?”

Five looked confused, then laughed. “You mean all that stuff about you I said to my siblings? Bullshit. I know there’s no way for me to change the timeline. You watched my actions in the aborted timeline and so you factored me in this time around. I’m irrelevant.”

“Then why did you go around and keep collecting your siblings? Why didn’t you give up the moment you realized that?”

“Because I had to pretend for Klaus and Diego and everyone. Also, they’re still kind of my siblings, they’ll at least get to see each other again before they die. Figured I’d give them that much,” Five said casually.

“So you really don’t care about stopping it or saving them anymore?”

“They’re not my real siblings and there’s nothing I can do about it. I’d rather be alive than dead.”

The Handler held out her hand, and Five took it. They vanished, and re-appeared in a room that looked a lot like a prison cell. It was rectangular and empty, with one door with a tiny window in it.

“Where are we?” Five asked, turning around. “I thought I was getting a job at the Commission.” He saw another woman in the room. “Who’s that?”

“You’re a good liar, Five,” The Handler said, “But I know you too well.”

The second woman took out a needle and jabbed it into Five’s neck.

“Nighty night.”

~~~

Klaus took Diego’s car to get Ben. He parked out front and walked up to the porch. The house looked the same as it did a few days ago, but the last time he was here felt like a million years ago.

He knocked on the door and waited this time for Ben to open it. The door opened slightly, and Klaus saw that the latch thing was still latched.

“Hey, it’s me,” Klaus said.

“Oh,” Ben replied. “Why are you here?”

“Coz everyone else is. I’m here to take you back to the mansion.”

“Um, well, I’ve decided not to come.”

“Ben, you can’t just decide not to-- could you let me in?”

Ben reluctantly unlatched the door and let Klaus in.

“Geez man, when’s the last time you showered? You’re definitely showering before coming back.”

“I told you, I’m not going with you.”

“Then why’d you let me in?”

There was an awkward silence. “Usually my only visitors are the people that drop off groceries…”

Internally Klaus was wondering if he’d have to give two pep talks in one day. He really didn’t want to hug Ben (at least not while he was like this).

“Ok, fine, sure. Why don’t you shower and shave and I’ll make coffee, or something…” Klaus said, looking at the messy kitchen.

“Okay, I guess…” Ben shuffled off and Klaus started putting dirty dishes in the dishwasher, cleaning surfaces (he didn’t look at the expiry date on the cleaning supplies, he didn’t want to know) and boiling water for some instant coffee he found. By the time Ben came back out, looking and smelling much more presentable, the kitchen wasn’t half bad.

“How do you like your coffee?” Klaus asked.

“Some sugar and milk, I guess.”

Klaus fixed him a cup and handed it to him.

“You’re not gonna have one?”

“No, I don’t drink caffeine.”

“Oh, ok.”

Klaus let Ben have a few sips. “You feeling better?”

“A bit, yeah.”

“Do you want to meet our siblings?”

Ben groaned. “I knew it! You’re just trying to get me out of the house!”

“In my defense this whole situation isn’t exactly healthy! Sue me for trying to get you to engage with your family.”

“My alleged family.”

“We’re your family, trust me.”

“Why should I?”

“Because I know you belong.”

“That’s meaningless.”

“And even if we aren’t, what’s the harm?”

Ben looked at him with serious eyes. “What’s the harm? I could hurt more innocent people, Klaus.”

“Look, I didn’t tell anyone about the murder situation, but they’re all aware you’re a little… fragile. They also know about the Horror, so it’s not like anyone is gonna try to provoke you.”

“Yeah well they might not try, but--”

“Look, man. I want to help you. That’s literally my job. But I can’t help you if you aren’t willing to help yourself.”

“It’s just… it’s a big step.”

Klaus sighed. “It is a big step,” he conceded, “and in better circumstances I wouldn’t do it to you this way, but these are the circumstances we’re in. I don’t have weeks to get you accustomed to leaving the house. We have to leave now.”

Ben put down the coffee cup and looked away. Yeah, two pep talks in one day.

“This self-imposed exile you’re putting yourself in… I get it. There was a time where I thought I didn’t deserve happiness either. It was a different sort of self-imposed punishment, but the principle is the same. You deserve to have a family, Ben. You don’t deserve this life. And what happened in the past isn’t your fault.”

“You don’t know the full story.”

“And I don’t need to.”

“I’m a murderer.”

“At least two more members of this family are. Jury’s out on the other three… and ya know, if we were really superheroes as kids, chances are we all killed…” Klaus said. That last part only occurred to him as he said it, and it sent shivers down his spine, but he could deal with his own moral hang-ups later. “Look, if you want me to leave you alone I’ll leave you alone, but I don’t think that’s the right choice.”

“Fine,” Ben said quietly. “Okay. Let’s go meet them.”

~~~

Diego stood up among the mass of papers and mess that the four at the house and Grace had created.

“I’m gonna take a little break y’all. Be back soon.”

“Take a break?” Luther asked.

“You can’t just leave. We’re all in this together,” Allison said irately.

“Look, I won’t be that long. But if the world’s ending there’s some stuff I wanna do first… that I’ve been putting off.”

“But the world’s not gonna end. We’re gonna stop it,” Luther said. Diego wasn’t sure if he was in denial or really believed that.

“Look, it’s just… I promised someone I’d meet them for lunch today. I can’t miss that appointment.”

“Ooooooo, you gotta girlfriend?” Luther asked teasingly.

“No. It’s a coworker,” Diego replied awkwardly.

“Just let him go,” Vanya said. “We’re wasting time when we could at least be working.”

Allison shrugged. “Whatever, I guess. Have a nice lunch.”

Diego left and walked to a sandwich place a few blocks away. When he went in he saw Eudora already sitting at a booth, so he went in and joined her.

“Hey. Sorry I’m late.”

“It’s okay,” Eudora replied, sounding like everything was not okay. “How are you?”

Diego looked confused. “I’m fine.”

“Really? Because you’ve been acting really weird lately. First there was all that stuff with letting that schoolboy go, and now you’re on leave. Are you really doing okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Diego said, picking at his nails and then picking up the menu. “I met my family. That’s why I’ve been on leave.”

“You… but I thought--?”

“Yeah, my brother reached out to me. It’s a long story. Anyways, that’s not what I’m here to talk about.”

“But that’s big news! No wonder you’ve been out of sorts. It must be exciting and--”

“Eudora!”

She went quiet and looked at him.

“Look… there’s something I’ve wanted to tell you for a long time. It’s just that… well, we’ve been friends since the Academy. You’re one of the first friends I made after the accident and you, well you helped me through a really difficult and confusing time in my life. But the longer I’ve known you the more I’ve realized that… I like you more than just a friend. I’m in love with you.” He looked up at her and she reached out and took his hand.

“Diego, I-- is now the best time for this? It sounds like you just had a really big life change, and--”

“I don’t know how much more time I have left!”

“I know we work a dangerous job, but you can’t act like the end of the world is around the corner all the time.”

“But what if it actually is?”

She looked at him like he was an idiot. “I can assure you it isn’t. Look, why don’t you get to know your family, take a vacation or something, and come back to work refreshed. Then we can talk about this.”

“Why do I have to wait? You either love me back or you don’t. Just tell me now.”

She looked sad. “I think your emotions are running high right now and--”

“You think I didn’t mean what I said? You think I lied to you??”

“No, not exactly.”

“You think I’m exaggerating.”

“Diego, you’re impossible to deal with when your emotions are flaring. That’s why I don’t want to have this conversation right now.”

Diego inhaled deeply through his nose. “Eudora. The world could end in three days. Don’t ask how I know. So yeah, I’m a little ‘emotional,’ or whatever right now. I want to spend my life with you and right now that could be under 72 hours.”

Eudora looked thoughtful for a moment. “I’m gonna tell Captain Danson to let you take the next two weeks off. I think the stress is getting to you. I’m serious, go to the beach or the mountains or the city, somewhere new, that you’ll enjoy, and take a breather.”

Diego put his head in his hands and groaned. “I’m so stupid…”

“You’re not stupid.”

“Then can’t you tell me if we have a future?”

“Maybe, if you take care of yourself.” She got up and gave him a peck on the forehead. “I think it’s probably best if I just head back to the station now…”

“Yeah…”

~~~

Five woke up, laying on the floor, feeling groggy and drugged. His whole body felt kind of fuzzy, like he was going to melt into a puddle at any moment. He slowly got up and tried to fix his dizziness by staring at his thumbs, but it didn’t help as well as it normally did. Five looked around the cell. It seemed perfectly normal, which confused him, because the Handler knew about his abilities. Dad had never made a room he couldn’t escape from (and Reginald had tried, it was one of his many unfinished science experiments) so he was less than half sure that the Commission could. He got in position and tried to blink, but nothing happened, no glow, none of the electric feeling he usually got. Suddenly, a panel in the door slid open, and Five saw a pair of familiar blue eyes.

“You awake yet, Five?”

Five grunted as he tried to blink. It hadn’t been this hard for him in… forever. Even as a little kid, it was second nature to him.

“You can’t blink out of there.”

“Why not? What did you do to the room?”

The Handler laughed. “The room? There’s no you-proofing a room.”

“It’s the drugs. You inhibited my powers. How. How did you do that?”

“Someone else already did most of the legwork for us,” she said. “Have fun in there Five. You’ll be there until you’ve changed your mind, which probably means you’ll be in there forever.” And with that, she shut the little panel and left Five alone with his thoughts, and there were many thoughts.

In no particular order:

Reginald. Reg used drugs to block Vanya’s powers. Was Five on similar drugs now?

The door. The door would have to be opened eventually, to bring him food and water (and a bucket…) if nothing else, unless they intended to kill him through starvation, but if they wanted to kill him why not put a bullet in his head or inject him with something deadly? Why is he still alive but drugged?

Five checked the door for any larger panel, one food could be brought through without opening the door. There didn’t seem to be one, and Five smiled at himself. The Commission could be real idotic sometime. There was no way food was coming through the looking panel, so at least once a day that door would be opened for food and water.

The drugs. Vanya took a pill every day for her powers, but it’s possible Five was on a higher dosage so he didn’t need to be topped off every day to keep his powers at bay. He certainly felt sort of ill, and Vanya didn’t seem to be this woozy their whole childhood. Unless she was and was just used to it. Now that’s a scary thought.

If all else fails, Five could wait until he figured out how often they gave him a shot, and try and escape right before the next one. On the other hand, maybe they would lace the food, forcing him to starve himself if he wanted to get off the drug, but if they were lacing the food and he didn’t eat, they’d probably give him another needle.

Five stumbled, and slid down the wall until he was sitting. He felt hopelessness welling inside him, more than ever before, because in the past, he could at least time travel poorly, and space jump out of any situation. He didn’t even have that anymore.

I’m not gonna give up.

That’s what Klaus had told him not that long ago. Five knew he was right, he was so close to the end of the road. Giving up now would mean everything was for nothing. His family was counting on him, and he was going to get out of this, no matter what it took.

Chapter Text

As Diego ate a sad, lonely lunch, Klaus and Ben drove back to the mansion.

“Oh, I should probably tell you Five is out right now. The one that’s a middle aged man but looks 13.”

“Hm.”

“Are… are you okay?” Klaus asked nervously.

“Yeah.” Ben’s nervousness seemed to have subsided a bit once all the anxiety of making a decision was gone.

“Good… good…”

“Are… are you okay?”

“I just feel a little… unethical right now.”

Ben raised an eyebrow. “Why…?”

“It’s just, well, I don’t really do CBT, that’s cognitive behavior therapy, but this just feels wrong.”

“What?”

“Oh, sorry, CBT is a type of therapy that involves taking small steps towards changing your thought patterns and helping you regulate emotions and anxiety. Right now I feel like I’m doing the opposite of that. Which feels… unethical… given the circumstances.”

“Ah. Well, uh--”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be doing this to you.”

“You’re not my therapist. You’re my… brother.”

“I know, but this is difficult enough for you. I shouldn’t be making it worse.”

“Does this car have music?”

“Sure, I mean, if you wanna figure out how to work the radio. It’s Diego’s.”

Ben fiddled with the buttons and dials and put on a rock station and sat back. Klaus stared at the road like he was supposed to and hoped things would be less awkward when he got back to the mansion.

Klaus parked out front and knocked on the door with Ben standing shyly behind him. Pogo opened the door with a grunt and Klaus saw stacks of paper everywhere.

“Woah. What happened here while I was out?”

Pogo sighed. “Where do I begin, Master Klaus… and hello Master Ben.”

“Uh… hi.”

“Oh, that’s Pogo. He’s the butler,” Klaus said before facepalming himself. “I’m sorry I should’ve told you…”

“It’s okay…”

Grace was comparing papers and scrawling furiously on the desk in the front room.

“This is Grace,” Klaus said to Ben. “She was our mom, and uh, she’s a robot.”

Grace looked up and smiled at the brothers. “Lovely to see you again.”

“Nice to meet you.”

“Um, as far as we know, Pogo, Grace, and Five are the only people alive on Earth who remember the Umbrella Academy as it happened,” Klaus said as he escorted Ben into the living room, which was also a document covered mess. “That’s Luther. He’s got super strength. That’s Vanya. She has telekinesis and glowy powers. And that’s Allison. She can ‘rumor’ people to do anything. Where’s Diego?”

“At some important lunch,” Allison said, coming over to them. “You must be Ben,” she said with her most charming smile. “Nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too.”

Luther and Vanya also came over and introduced themselves. There was another awkward silence.

“You wanna sit down?” Klaus asked Ben.

“Sure, yeah.”

Ben sat down and the other four adults looked at each other stiffly.

“Uh well,” Allison said, clapping her hands together. “Let’s get back to work. Klaus, you can take Diego’s pile for the time being--”

“Uh, actually, Ben, you want some water?”

“Ooh, yes, water would be great.”

“We’ll be right back.

~~~

Klaus held a glass under the sink in the kitchen.

“How you doing?”

“Uh, it’s a lot.”

“I’m so sorry,” Klaus said. He handed the glass to Ben and he took a sip of water. “Y’know I’m gonna get myself a glass too.” He did, and took a drink.

“Tell me about them,”

“Uh, okay, well… I don’t really know Luther that well. He seems nice enough though, if not the sharpest knife in the drawer. Vanya may be small but she’s… well she’s powerful and a bit explosive, to be honest. Allison is, uh, complicated. I don’t think she’s a bad person in her heart but her lifestyle and work… well, I guess I’ll just say making millions from nothing requires one to make certain choices. Uh, Diego, I like him. I mean he’s a cop, so obviously that’s not great, but other than that, I guess,” he took a sip of water, “And let’s see. Five. I don’t quite get Five. But he’s a good guy.”

“Why is his name Five?”

“Oh, we actually just found out about this right before we came and got you. Good ol’ Reg didn’t name us. He gave us numbers. I guess Five never picked one or something.”

“He gave us numbers??”

“Yeah. You’re six, Diego’s two, and Five is five. I think Luther is one because Reginald referred to him as ‘my chosen leader’ when I summoned him, and that just leaves me, Allison, and Vanya. I’m sure Five can tell us who’s three, four, and seven when he gets back, if you’re curious.”

“That’s really fucked up.”

“No shit.”

“Also, you summoned him??”

“Yeah, that’s my… thing. I would say sorry that you had to miss it but it wasn’t a very fun time.”

Ben shrugged. “Alright then.”

“You ready to go back up?”

Ben finished his water. “Yeah, let’s go back up.”

~~~

Diego handed the waitress his card to pay for lunch and sighed. He really didn’t want to go back to the mansion after that mess. He kind of wanted to eat ice cream and binge crappy daytime TV. On the other hand, he had a job to do. With Five gone, he was kind of the leader, and he couldn’t just leave his newfound family by themselves.

~~~

“Well someone took a long lunch,” Luther said as Diego walked in.

“Yeah, and what are you gonna do about it?”

Luther didn’t have a good reply.

Klaus and Ben walked in from the kitchen right then.

“Oh, Diego! You’re back,” Klaus said. “This is Ben.”

“Hi.”

“Hi.”

The two shook hands, and then there was an awkward silence.

“Well…” Diego said, “I have some training with code breaking so I’m gonna go help m--Grace. Would you two mind taking over the Americas for me?”

“Nope, not at all,” Klaus replied. “Also did you almost just--”

“Shut up.”

The afternoon passed, and the Hargreeves siblings and Grace worked as hard as they could to find any sort of world ending anomaly. Luther, Allison, Klaus, Vanya, and Ben took a field trip to the library while Grace and Diego stayed home to try and decode Reginald’s secret language, but it was difficult work, especially without the police resources he’d usually have, like computers and a dedicated team who were specially trained for this. Around 8pm, the four came back to the house and the two teams swapped information. Diego and Grace didn’t have much more to say other than “this code is kicking our asses,” while the others reported on events they found.

“So, in summary, there’s been explosions over Siberia, a strange pattern of shark attacks in Japan, rising civil unrest in Argentina, and a new bacterial disease that seems to be in the water supply in Kenya,” Klaus said.

“Hmm… are any of those really world-ending?” Diego asked.

“I’d put my money on the water thing,” Allison said.

“Me too,” Luther added.

“And that’s just the new-ish stuff,” Allison continued. “Obviously there’s ongoing civil unrest across the Middle East, in Venezuela, here, in the UK and Ireland, and North Korea is being itself. There’s no reason why any of those conflicts can’t suddenly blow up and cause a nuclear holocaust.”

“It’s probably not nuclear,” Vanya said. “Considering Five doesn’t have any sort of radiation poisoning.”

“Who knows, he might,” Klaus said with an eyeroll. “He doesn’t tell us anything.”

“He’d probably be dead, Klaus,” Vanya replied flatly. “I should’ve specified. All the food and water would likely be contaminated. So we can count nuclear annihilation out.”

Allison looked thoughtful. “That’s an interesting point. Whatever it is can’t be so destructive as to make it impossible for Five to survive for 45 years. Maybe we can rule out a pandemic.”

“Could he have caught a disease from a corpse, though?” Luther asked. Everyone looked at Klaus.

“I’m not that kind of doctor. I’m not a doctor at all. I barely studied this kind of stuff.”

“I wish he was here so we could question him,” Vanya sighed.

“Well he’s not,” Diego said brusquely.

“We shouldn’t give up on the elimination method,” Ben said, speaking up for the first time. “Maybe we’re going about this all wrong. We should list every big apocalypse cause we can think of and then try to rule them out.”

“That sounds really smart,” Luther said. “Zombies!”

“It’s definitely not zombies, idiot!” Diego snapped, turning to Luther with an utterly dumbfounded look on his face. “Even Five couldn’t have not brought up fucking zombies!”

“I wonder if you two bickered a lot as kids…” Allison said offhandedly.

Diego turned to her, “Why?”

“Would you kids like me to bring out a whiteboard?” Grace asked. She saw each of their faces scrunch in their own peculiar way as if they were preparing to say “we’re not kids” but none of them actually said it.

“Yes,” Allison said, “That would be very helpful.”

~~~

They cleared out a space and Grace rolled in a big whiteboard like the ones you have in school, with some dry erase markers, and Allison designated herself note-taker and started writing down plausible apocalypse ideas. Klaus couldn’t help but feel a sense of weirdness in his stomach that they were getting along TOO well and being TOO productive. Grace brought dinner, and as the night went on Klaus grew more worried about Five. They also had compiled a causes list:

- Pandemic
- Asteroid impact
- Natural Weather Events (Tsunamis, Hurricanes, Earthquakes, etc) (possibly caused by global warming?)
- Sun flare (need to research after affects of a sun flare)
- Extreme Temperature Change - Hot or Cold (ask Five ab weather)
- Mass extinction causing ripple effects
- Ice cap melted
= Tectonic plate fuckery

Allison checked her watch. “Holy shit, it’s 11 o’clock. I need to get home.”

“I think we made a lot of progress today, gang,” Luther said with a smile.

“I’m concerned about Five,” Klaus interrupted. Everyone else exchanged glances.

“I’ve been wondering about that too,” Diego said. “If the Commission has time machines, shouldn’t he have arrived back the moment he left?”

His question left the group in silence.

“You think maybe they captured him?” Vanya asked quietly.

“How could they capture him?” Allison asked. “He has his whole blinking thing.”

Vanya opened her mouth as if to say something, and then closed it again.

“Maybe they’re sedating him.” Diego offered. “Keeping him unconscious so he can’t.”

“Yeah that seems plausible,” Vanya added.

“Or maybe they killed him.” Ben said.

“You think they’d do that?” Luther asked, wide-eyed.

“He was an assassin…” Klaus said, “If they’re really that morally bankrupt… No. I just, no. I don’t believe they killed him.”

“Why the hell not?” Diego asked.

“I dunno, I just don’t. He could be useful, with his powers and stuff, and maybe they’re not that morally bankrupt, I hardly know anything about them…”

“In other words, you’re an optimist,” Diego said bluntly.

Klaus opened his mouth to rebut that statement, and then closed it again. There was a time in his life where he would’ve laughed if someone called him an optimist, maybe even would’ve said “are you serious???” but lately he’s been having a much better time at life, and there are worse things to be than an optimist. So all he said was, “Yeah, I guess.”

“Well I’m an optimist too,” Luther said. “And I sure hope he’s still alive.”

“Well of course I HOPE he’s alive,” Diego retorted.

“Guys, we’re getting off topic,” Allison interrupted. “We don’t need to argue about personal philosophy right now,” (Klaus rolled his eyes). “Maybe Five’s plan is just taking a while, or maybe he’s back and just hasn’t contacted us. I mean, you’ve known him the longest and you keep going on about how he doesn’t share anything,” Allison said, gesturing at Klaus.

“We should all go get a good night’s sleep,” Vanya said. “If Five isn’t back by tomorrow we can start worrying about him.”

Klaus wanted to say something along the lines of “we have a little over 72 hours left to go, I’m not sure getting 8 hours of sleep is the best use of our time,” but on the other hand he thought his body might collapse at any minute. He was doing a good job keeping up appearances, but he was dog tired after the past few days. The part of his mind that wanted sleep also reminded him that his control on his powers got worse the less sleep he got.

“Yeah,” Allison said, let’s go get some sleep. Meet back here tomorrow morning at 8am.” Everyone agreed.

Allison drove home, while Diego took the other four back to the hotel. Klaus considered asking Diego to take him home so he could see Aaron again, but he also didn’t want to leave Ben. He sighed, and decided to sleep at the hotel, and just call Aaron. Besides, if everything worked out he’d have the rest of his life to be with him.

They all got settled in the hotel, Ben choosing to sleep in the other bed in Klaus’s room, and Klaus called Aaron from the common area.

“Hello?” Aaron said, picking up the phone.

“Hey, it’s me.”

“Ohmygod, where are you? How are you?”

“I’m at the Royal Inn downtown with some of my siblings. And I’m fuckin’ beat. I flew to Russia and back in like… a day, plus time zone fuckery, to get my sister--”

“Why the hell would you do that?”

Klaus was momentarily silent.

“I know I don’t know the whole story, Klaus. I thought we agreed to no secrets.”

Klaus sighed. “If I told you, you wouldn’t believe me.”

“I believed you when you told me about the ghost stuff.”

“You did make me show you,” Klaus teased.

“Yeah, but I was pretty much ready to accept it when you told me.”

Klaus was silent again.

“One question. What did you say your siblings’ names are?” Aaron asked.

“Uh, there’s Five, Diego, Luther, Allison, Vanya, and Ben.”

“Another question. Do you think I’m stupid?”

Klaus was kind of taken aback. “No. Why-- what do those things have to do with each other?”

“I grew up reading comic books, Klaus. For fuck’s sake I still have a collection of some of them in the apartment.”

Klaus was a different kind of silent, and he felt his stomach drop. “How long have you known?”

“I suspected it pretty quickly…”

“Why didn’t you say anything??”

“Because I’d sound crazy!! And maybe it was a coincidence! And I still don’t have an explanation for why Five is a kid if you all have the same birthday!”

“Time travel shenanigans. I don’t really know how to-- well, when Five explained it he sounded really smart.”

“But… being comic book characters doesn’t explain why you did that whole Russia thing to yourself…”

“You know how the Umbrella Academy had to save the world…?”

“How--” Aaron’s voice dropped, “is the Murder Magician real? The Conductor? Dr. Terminal?”

“What? No. The world is ending. The apocalypse is coming. And we don’t know how.”

“Well it might be one of them.”

“Hm… I’m not sure… I feel like somebody would’ve noticed if a real-life supervillain was preparing to destory the world.”

“Well maybe they break out of Hotel Oblivion and cause it.”

Klaus’s eyes lit up in shock. He remembered Five briefly bringing up schematics for a hotel. “What?”

“Hotel Oblivion. It was a terrible prison on the moon that the Umbrella Academy sent their defeated enemies too. In the comics they’d break out all the time, presumably so the writers wouldn’t have to create new villains.”

“Who owned Hotel Oblivion in the comics?”

“It’s kinda unclear. Sometimes it’s insinuated The Monocle owns it though.”

“Holy fuck, I should’ve told you everything sooner.”

“What?”

“It’ll take too long to explain over the phone. Besides, I really need some fucking sleep. I’ll tell you the whole story when I can.”

“Ok,” Aaron said, a bit disappointed. “Love you. And I miss you.”

“I love and miss you too.”

Klaus hung up, and barely got his shoes off before falling into his bed.

Chapter Text

Klaus woke up and he felt so much better. He stretched, yawned, and sat up, and looked at the other bed. Ben wasn’t there. This didn’t bother him too much. Maybe Ben was an early riser or something. Then he looked at the clock. 10:52 am. His jaw dropped and he jumped out of bed and rushed out of the room. The other bedroom doors were open and the rooms were empty. He rushed into the common area and saw a note on the countertop.

“You seemed really tired last night so we decided to let you sleep in. We went to the mansion w/o you. Come join us when you’re up. Vanya, Luther, and Ben.” He read. And then he remembered his conversation last night with Aaron. “Shit, shit, shit, shit,” he said, running back to his room to get changed and ready for the day. He called the front desk to order a taxi and rushed to the mansion as fast as he could.

As he pounded on the door he considered asking Pogo for keys, and when he opened the door, Klaus flew in and saw that the main focus of everyone’s efforts was now on Reginald’s impossible code. The list that they’d made yesterday was now copied into the corner of the whiteboard, and the rest of it was covered in cyphers, notes, and some tic tac toe games. Luther and Diego were arguing at a table while Grace was working, Allison was writing and erasing stuff on the white board, and Ben and Vanya had their noses stuck in code cracking books from the library.

“There’s a hotel jail on the moon!” Klaus cried out. Everyone stopped what they were doing to look at him. “Also- why didn’t you wake me up???”

“There’s a what?” Allison asked.

“You were so pooped last night,” Luther explained.

“One thing at a time,” Vanya said.

“There’s a HOTEL that is also a PRISON on the MOON,” Klaus said slowly, before explaining his phone conversation with Aaron last night.

“Are we sure that’s real?” Allison said. “That’s like, really far-fetched. Besides, just because we’re real people doesn’t mean all the villains our comic versions fought were real. They could’ve been made up.”

“But then why would Hargreeves have brought us up as superheroes in the first place?”

Allison shrugged. “Vanity project? Maybe we just picked up litter in national parks and fought bank robbers and other petty violent crimes.”

“It was probably a vanity project, but still…” Klaus said, trailing off. He wanted to say: “I can’t believe Reginald didn’t tell us any of this,” but unfortunately, he could.

“Aha,” Diego said, finding the hotel architectural drawings from a pile on the floor. “Hmm… I was wondering what these things are on the doors to the rooms,” he said, as everyone gathered around to see. “Maybe they’re some kind of locking mechanism.”

“That would explain this,” Grace said, pulling up another drawing. “I was wondering what that machine was meant for.”

The drawing looked like the basement of the hotel, and there was a detailed schematic of some kind of machine in the middle.

“What do you think it’s for?” Klaus asked nervously.

“Torture. I think it’s a torture machine,” Grace responded sincerely. Everyone was a bit taken aback. Except Diego.

“Is it really that shocking he made a torture machine?” Diego asked rhetorically.

“No,” Klaus answered, recalling his second-to-last conversation with Five before he disappeared. “I mean he tortured me without any fancy machinery, so--”

“What?!” Luther and Ben cried out at nearly the same time.

“Uh, we can discuss that later,” Klaus said, feeling like an evasive teen who didn’t want to answer one of his own questions. “That reminds me, where are we on the Five situation? Is he back?”

Everyone exchanged solemn glances. “No,” Allison said.

“Well what are we doing about that?” he asked.

“What can we do about it?” she asked back. “The Commission is a time travel agency. They could be anywhere and anywhen on the planet. If he’s not there, who knows where, then? We just have to hope he comes back.”

“I refuse to accept that,” Klaus said. “I mean, if there are time traveling assassins all over the timeline, someone must’ve noticed that, right?”

“Klaus, there’s a million unsolved murder cases all over the world,” Diego interupted. “Are you gonna assume they were all done by time travelers?”

“Has there ever been a case where two murders decades, if not centuries apart, appeared to be done by the same person?”

“I mean…” Diego said hesitantly.

“You sound like a conspiracy theorist,” Vanya deadpanned. “And if you go around asking questions like that, all you’re gonna get are conspiracy theorist answers.”

“Vanya’s right,” Allison said. “And it could be impossible to separate the truth from the crazy. They might even be all mixed up. I wish there was something we could do, but I don’t think there is.”

“Well I don’t believe that!” Klaus exploded. “If you told me a week ago about all this shit,” he cried, flailing his arms around, “I would’ve called you a conspiracy theorist! And don’t you fucking tell me ‘oh, I wish there was something we could do!’ Allison! Why didn’t you wish that before you fucking killed Walter Abel!”

Everyone looked aghast at Allison. “Klaus, I--”

Klaus stormed out, and instinctively went to his room where he sat on his floor, let out a few tears, and calmed down. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been that mad. Maybe he’d never been that mad.

As he calmed down, he thought more thoroughly about his thoughts and his actions, which he deeply regretted. He regretted yelling, and he most especially regretted spilling the secret of Walter Abel to everyone and then leaving Allison to explain herself. They’d all been getting along too well and now Klaus knew why: he was destined to wreck it. He felt a shiver go down his spine, like he had just unlocked a self-destructive streak within himself. Of course he knew about that streak, it’s what kept him an addict for all those years, but this was something deeper, something that started before the drugs, and most certainly couldn’t be blamed on them.

But why? Why did he have this outburst? The answer was simple really, once he admitted it to himself. He didn’t just like Five, he loved him. Five was his family, his brother, and Klaus desperately wanted to see him safe and home again. He sighed, collected himself, and wiped his face with his hands, and stood up to go back downstairs and collect himself.

And then he heard something in the hallway.

~~~

Five gripped his fists so hard his palms bled with four finger-nail shaped cuts each, and he couldn’t make them glow even a tiny bit, let alone open a portal. He panted and cried out and slammed his fists against the wall. He sat back down and took a few deep breaths. Blinking was out of the question, and he wished with hindsight that he hadn’t pushed himself so hard. He decided to try and sleep and prepare himself. As soon as someone opened that door they were going to be in for the fight of their life, blinking or no blinking.

Five actually did manage to doze off (he figured the drugs probably helped with that) before hearing the door creak open. He opened his eyes and saw a small man with a plate with stuff on it in the doorway.

“Mr. Five?” the man asked.

“Yes?” Five replied, slowly sitting up, preparing himself to leap into action.

“H-here’s dinner,” the man said, putting the plate down and slightly sliding it towards him. He was off balance and in a vulnerable position, so Five lunged towards him, grabbed his arm to destabilize him, and then threw him down, while putting his right foot in the door to keep it open. Five then flipped the small man around and pinned him to the ground in the middle of the cell.

“Please don’t hurt me!” the man yelped.

“Oh good, you’re not fighting back. Now I won’t have too,” Five said with a smile. He quickly let go and slipped through the door into the hallway, and started speedwalking to try and find the briefcase room before anyone saw him (and hopefully not everyone knew about the new body situation). He wanted to run, but running would only make him seem suspicious, so he put his bloody hands in his pockets and walked as fast as he could without losing his balance through the hallways that seemed to lean back and forth.

Unfortunately, he didn’t find the briefcase room, but he did find the lunch room. Food. He had never wanted food before quite so much as he did now, and he had lived through 45 years of an apocalypse. Luckily the lunchroom was quite busy, so he grabbed a turkey sandwich and ate it as fast as possible as he kept moving, hoping the carbs and/or the protein would make him feel better.

Five heard heels clicking behind him, over-the-top 5 inch heels that could only belong to one person, coming around the corner right now. He threw himself into the nearest room and hit the ground, and the clicking heels passed. He looked up.

“Oh shit,” he said. He was looking at the infinite switchboard.

~~~

“Yeah, things have been going really well,” a muffled voice said through the wall. Klaus cupped his hands to the wall and listened. Someone was talking on the phone in the adjacent room.

“Well Klaus just self-imploded, Allison and Diego are yelling at each other, and Luther and Ben are having panic attacks, so I think the teamwork is finally gonna go down the drain.”

There was a pause. Klaus’s stomach dropped. One, Ben was having a panic attack and it was his fault, plus this person was talking about him and other four siblings, and they didn’t have the lilt of Grace’s voice or the tiredness of Pogo’s. Vanya was in the other room.

“I didn’t expect them to work this well together in the first place! You told me they were a bunch of dysfunctional nincompoops.”

Pause.

“Ok, yeah, I can do that.”

Pause.

“Thanks.”

Pause.

“I should probably get back there before Klaus shows his face again. He’s weirdly the most perceptive of the bunch. Probably his psychology training… Also, it would also be suspicious to the others.”

Pause.

“What? No. These were the assholes that ruined my life. If it wasn’t for them I’d have a real family. Shouldn’t I be collecting intel? Oh shit, I nearly forgot. Allison murdered someone a few years back,” Vanya laughed, “I mean, talk about leverage. Ok… yeah… talk to you later.”

Klaus heard her hang up the phone, open the door, and walk away. Then he started having his own panic attack. He thought she was being suspicious, Five thought she was being suspicious, and now she really is suspicious! Who was she talking to on that phone??

Klaus took a deep breath. There’d be time to panic later. He snuck out of his room and went into the room next door and pressed the button to call the last number. All he got was that three tone beep and an automated message telling him that the number he’s calling does not exist. He hung up the phone and went downstairs, half praying everyone was still yelling at each other so he could stand on the couch and yell at them to shut up and then apologize, but when he entered the living room, it was quiet. Grace and Vanya were cleaning up the mess they’d made and everyone else was gone.

“Where is everyone?” He asked.

“Ben begged Diego to take him home, and Luther asked if Diego could take him home too, so he did. Allison left in a huff. Looked like she was on the brink of tears,” Vanya said. “Where were you?”

“The roof,” Klaus lied. “We need to collect everyone and I need to apologize.”

Vanya made a face. “I’d wait a bit, if I were you. Everyone was really upset.”

“Vanya, we might have 60 hours or less before the world’s destroyed! I don’t have time for everyone to calm down!”

Vanya shrugged. “Look I wasn’t saying wait a full day or anything…”

“I’m gonna go use the phone,” Klaus said darkly. “I have calls to make.”

~~~

Klaus called Allison first. He called her business number and got her receptionist, who told her Allison wasn’t in. Then he called her home phone number, and someone else picked up.

“Hello?” a man said.

“Hi, I’m trying to reach Allison Fama.”

“And who are you?”

“I’m her brother. Klaus.”

“Allison doesn’t have any family.”

“Well she does, actually, we just got in contact. Who am I speaking to, by the way?”

“Her husband.”

Klaus’s jaw dropped, but he contained his mild shock. Allison does seem like the kind of person to get married and have an idyllic-from-the-outside family. “Well, when you see her could you give her a message for me?”

There was a pause. “Uh, fine, I guess.”

“Tell her Klaus says he’s extremely sorry for what he said and he needs her to come back. She’ll understand.”

“Ok.”

“Thank you so much.”

“Uh, you’re welcome.”

Klaus hung up the phone, sighed in frustration, and called Diego’s house. Got voicemail. Left a message similar to the one he left for Allison. Klaus didn’t have Luther/Henry’s number and he wasn’t sure Ben had a phone. He went back out to the living room where Grace was finishing tidying up. All the furniture was back in place, and Klaus assumed Vanya summoned her powers again to move it back. That only made him more terrified to talk to her. Klaus went to the entry hall and found Vanya waiting there.

“Hey,” Klaus said.

“Hello again.”

“So I was wondering if maybe we could hang out for a bit before everyone cools down and comes back.”

“I called a cab actually, to take me back to the hotel.”

“Are you leaving?” Klaus said, letting a tinge of panic slip through.

“No, I’m not abandoning the team. It’s just kind of hard to relax here,” she said with a shiver.

“You feel it too?” Klaus asked. “I always feel like I’m being watched when I’m here. And not just by normal ghosts…”

Vanya nodded absentmindedly.

“So uh, what do you do, outside of the orchestra? Like, what’s your day job?”

“It is my day job.”

“Oh, I didn’t realize that.”

“Yeah, well, when you get to my level, it’s a full time gig.”

“That’s really cool.”

Vanya lowered one eyebrow. “Are you okay? You weren’t this awkward back in Russia when we first met.”

“I’m just nervous. And I caused a huge setback. And we still don’t know where Five is.”

“Mm,” Vanya said with a nod.

There was an awkward pause, and then Klaus continued his line of questioning. Usually when he was coaxing information out of someone else he wasn’t concerned about their ability to seriously injure him.

“So uh, the orchestra must be like your family, huh?” Klaus said.

“Mm… I suppose I am friends with many of them,” Vanya said. “But they’re not my family.”

“Did you, you know… make a family?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well I just learned Allison has a husband. Maybe she has kids too, I dunno. I have Aaron. I’m not really sure about the others. But I’m sure Diego and Luther have support systems, how ‘bout you?”

Vanya’s nostrils flared a little bit. “I’m self-sufficient. I don’t need anyone.”

“That’s a lie,” Klaus said casually.

“Excuse me?” Vanya asked.

“I said, you’re lying. I mean, come on, you don’t need a psych degree to know everyone needs people to lean on.”

“I have friends! I have friends in the orchestra and outside the orchestra! And this is awfully personal, you know.”

“We are siblings.”

“Newsflash, Klaus! He unadopted us! I’ve known you for three days! We’re not siblings!”

“Oh…” Klaus said, looking at the floor. “I just thought I was getting to know you.”

There was a honking outside.

“That’s my taxi,” Vanya says. “And you don’t know me,” she added, as she walked and opened the front door.

“I don’t, do I?” Klaus asked, looking at her enigmatically before she turned away and went to the taxi.

Klaus walked back into the living room, where Grace still was.

“Can you keep a secret?” he asked her.

“Yes.”

“Good. I think Vanya’s a double agent and I need to know who she’s working for.”

Chapter Text

Five looked up at the infinite switchboard in awe. He had heard of it, of course, but during his tenure at the Commission he never had the honor of operating it. He was quite lucky that this section of the infinite switchboard was empty (he thought that the sections were never supposed to be unattended, but they are infinite, and the Commission isn’t great about scheduling and stuff like that). He had asked the Handler about the infinite switchboard once, but she had only given him a vague answer about pins and nodes and dials. He looked at the machine in front of him and steadied himself by leaning on it. All he needed to find was April 1st, 2019. If he could find April 1st, 2019, then the world was saved.

He started plugging in pins and messing with dials and buttons and realized that the infinite switchboard was somewhat similar to the giant hidden computer in the mansion. First the drug that the Handler implied was based off of Reginald’s invention for Vanya, and now this. One problem at a time though, and Five vowed to get to this one after the apocalypse was stopped. Once Five made this connection, he was more easily able to navigate the switchboard, and found himself scrolling through time, from the creation of the Earth through dinosaurs and up to ancient Egypt, Greece, the Renaissance, the World Wars, the turn of the millenium, and--! Five stopped scrolling. The date at the top of the screen said “SEPTEMBER 29 2017.” Five started scrolling very slowly as the months ticked away until he got to the present, and saw the moon explode from a beam of light and moon chunks hit the Earth. While this was important, he needed to find the source of the beam, he scrolled back and then zoomed in, but wasn’t zoomed in enough by the time a hand laid on his shoulders. Five saw the Handler staring down at him, her heels in her other hand.

As the Handler opened her mouth, Five shot a punch up to her face and as she stumbled back, he instinctively got into formation to open a portal, until he remembered he couldn’t. But he saw sparks of blue form at his fist. His eyes widened. His powers were returning. If he could just have a little longer!

The Handler stood up and Five ran out of there as fast as he could. If there was one thing that he liked about being in his young body again, it was the lung capacity. This body was entering the prime of its life and hadn’t spent 45 years breathing polluted air. He cheered himself by thinking about all these advantages over the Handler. She wasn’t even wearing shoes.

He ran with his fists clenched, trying to open a portal, but he hadn’t ever tried to open one while running at top speed before. His vision was still blurry, and he realized he was leaning right and had to push himself off the wall.

One disadvantage of running was that people noticed him now and were trying to stop or catch him. He managed to dodge their attempts, thankful that he was running into office workers instead of field agents.

Someone grabbed him from behind and all rational thought went out the window as Five bit their forearm as hard as he could and they yelled and let him go. He made it to the briefcase room, grabbed one and opened it, just wanting to go anywhere but here.

Five’s senses were all filled to the brim as he nearly suffocated amongst a barrage of light, sound, smells, and bodys grinding against each other. Music blared into his ears and he ran out of the crowd towards the bar, and realized he was in a nightclub, and based on the clothing everyone was wearing, it was the late 70’s. He snuck past the bouncer and onto the street, and realized he was just inside Studio 54, a famous club for debauchery of all kinds. Of course, the Commission would be following him now, so he went under a streetlight and set the coordinates for his father’s mansion on March 30th, 2019.

~~~

“-I need to know who she’s working for,” Klaus said.

Before Grace could respond, a giant portal opened in the living room and Five came through it, and then the portal closed.

“Holy shit!” Klaus cried, startled.

“Hi, hey, what’s today?”

“The 30th.”

“Wonderful.” Five then left the room, still holding the big briefcase.

“Where are you going??” Klaus asked, following him into the hall.

“I’m getting a toolkit. I need to disable the tracking device on this briefcase immediately, and I’d prefer not to smash it.”

“Okay, that makes sense…” Klaus responded, “So, uh, where the fuck have you been?”

“Commission. It was a trap.”

“Five, you’re gonna have to be a bit more specific than that. Also Vanya’s a double agent.”

Five suddenly stopped and looked up at Klaus, dead serious. “A double agent for who?”

“I don’t know,” Klaus replied, before explaining what had been going on since Five left. As Klaus explained, the pair walked to a workshop room and Five got out a screwdriver and other tools and began disassembling part of the briefcase.

“Let’s look at our options here,” Five said after Klaus finished, carefully taking out a small shiny pill-sized component. “The person she’s working for has to know about our childhoods, so that leaves out everyone except me, Grace, Pogo, and the Commission. She’s not a double agent for me, and Grace didn’t know anything until I intervened. Pogo’s an asshole but he’s not exactly the scheming type. She’s working for the Commission.”

“But how?”

“They must’ve reached out to her sometime after Reg dropped her off in Moscow.” Five then started putting the pieces of the briefcase back together, minus that component.

“And why would she be working for them?”

“You ever heard of propaganda?”

“Yes--”

Five then took a hammer, and smashed the component into tinier pieces. He collected the pieces, and dumped the smashed bits of glass and metal into Klaus’s hands. “Could you flush this down the toilet for me?” Five asked.

“Uh… sure? But then we need to keep planning. There’s still so much we don’t know.”

“Well actually… I’ve just solved it.”

“Solved it? The cause of the apocalpse? How we can stop it?”

“Yes and yes,” Five then explained his journey and what he saw on the infinite switchboard. “I didn’t know where that beam came from when I saw it on the screen. I mean, I had a hunch, but I couldn’t be sure. Now I am. Vanya’s the source. She’s the bomb.”

“So we have to convince her not to blow up the moon?”

“Basically.”

“Seems awfully easy.”

“I don’t think it will be.”

~~~

Klaus disposed of the pieces, and went down to the kitchen to meet Five (Five said he was off to get some coffee). He found the kid asleep in his chair, head resting on his arms on the table.

Klaus had noticed, when Five had arrived back, that the circles under his eyes were deeper and darker, his hands were stained with dried blood, and he looked like he was about to come down with the flu. He sighed, and knew in his heart he wasn’t going to wake Five up, so he turned and found himself at a loss. Before Five arrived, Klaus wanted Grace’s help on digging up dirt about Vanya, but if she’s in cahoots with the Commission, they probably wouldn’t be able to find anything, assuming the Commission isn’t a sloppy mess.

He did end up going upstairs and asking Grace for information, but it was the address of Diego’s apartment and his suite number.

~~~

Klaus grabbed a cab to Diego’s apartment building and dialed the number to reach him on the intercom.

“Hello?” Diego said, picking up.

“It’s me. I want to talk.”

“Yeah, you know what, me too,” Diego replied, sounding a bit angry. Klaus’s chest tightened, but he deserved it, he screwed up.

“Well, could you let me in, or come down here, or something?”

The door buzzed. “I’m apartment 504,” Diego said, before hanging up.

Klaus went up, knocked on his door, and Diego let him in. Diego’s apartment was minimalist, but not in a trendy minimalist way. It was just minimally decorated, fairly clean, and neat enough. Klaus stood in the entranceway, until Diego gestured towards a couch. Klaus sat down on the couch and Diego sat down in the easy chair next to the couch.

“I’m sorry,” Klaus blurted out. “I’m sorry for how I behaved.”

Diego nodded, trying to look sage or something. “Why didn’t you tell me about what Allison did?”

“I was trying to be kind to her. I didn’t think everyone needed to know. Also like, you’re a cop, man.”

Diego considered this. “Fair enough. Apology accepted.”

“Fantastic, because a bunch of shit has happened since my little temper tantrum,” Klaus said, then explaining that bunch of shit. Diego stared at his brother, trying to absorb all this information as fast as he possibly could.

Once Klaus finished, Diego stared off into space for a solid 20 seconds.

“Well…” he eventually said, “I say we go to the hotel and convince Vanya not to blow up the moon.”

“Why would she listen to us?”

“We’re her family.”

“She was actually pretty cold to me when she left the mansion… I’m concerned she might suspect we’re onto her.”

Diego rolled his eyes. “That’s why you leave the investigating to the professionals.”

Klaus wanted to yell out something along the lines of “Well I’m sorry! You all abandoned me!! I didn’t know what else to do!!” but he kept his word hole shut. He now had one awake ally. He took a breath and continued. “What do we do then? Do we collect everyone else and tell them and confront her together? I feel like that’s asking for a fight. Do we just send one of us to the hotel to talk to her? Who?”

“You and me, Klaus, that’s who,” Diego said, wholly confident in himself.

“Why us?”

“Well I don’t know who to trust now. The circus? Maybe that’s a cover and when Luther’s away he’s really at the Commission. And we all know Allison’s got skeletons in her closet, and Ben? What if he lets the Horror out during the confrontation?”

“Well what if Vanya uses her powers against us? We know she uses them to blow up the moon. What if she kills us? She’s so much more powerful than us combined.”

Diego looked down. “Well I could always… you know,” he said, making his hand into the symbol for a gun and doing a shooting motion.

“NO. First of all we shouldn’t go around shooting people--”

“It’s kinda part of my job--”

“And second of all, she’d probably blast the bullet into a bunch of tiny shrapnel pieces!”

“Oh yeah.”

“Thank GOD you’re not trying to do this alone,” Klaus said with a laugh. Diego kind of laughed too. “But seriously… I think we should wait for Five. He knows the most about the Commission and probably has some really useful information if we can coax it out of him.”

“Well, let’s go back to the mansion and wake him up.”

Klaus hesitated. “He really looked beat.”

“You were pissed off when we didn’t wake you up. You really think Five is any different.”

Klaus thought that over, and had to agree.

~~~

Klaus shook Five’s shoulders. “Wake up.”

Five slowly came to life. “How long was I out?”

“About an hour.”

“Is the Commission here?”

“No. We just want to talk with you about the Vanya situation.”

“Oh good, Diego’s back.”

Five took a sip of his coffee and spit it back into the cup, dumped the old, cold coffee into the sink, and started making a fresh batch.

“Well?” Diego asked. “What do you think we should do?”

“I’m not sure,” Five replied. “I don’t know how brainwashed she is and how committed she is to ending the world."

“She seemed pretty sane to me,” Klaus said. “Suspicious and weird, but sane.”

“Not all brainwashed people are crazy, Klaus.”

“Shouldn’t you of all people know that?” Diego asked.

“I’ve never dealt with a person who’s been brainwashed by an evil time traveling agency before!”

“Look,” Five said, “They way I see it, we’re gonna have to confront her sooner or later about this. The decisions we have to make are about how we choose to do it. I think I should talk to her alone. We’re the only people that know what the Commission is like. I’m the only one who can confirm if what she’s been told about our childhoods is true, and making her feel outnumbered could be dangerous.”

“There’s no way we’re letting you do this alone,” Diego said. “You need back-up. You saw how powerful she is.”

“Yeah. You confront her alone, but we’ll be closeby. We can even get Luther, Allison, and Ben back too.”

“We know Allison can stop her if things get too dangerous,” Diego said darkly.

“Why?” Five said. “So if the conversation goes even slightly downhill you all jump out and reveal yourselves, she realizes it’s a trap, and attacks us? When I said ‘alone’ I meant it.”

“And when I said ‘there’s no way we’re letting you do this alone’ I meant it,” Diego countered. “She’s already planning on blowing up the moon. We’re dead in two days if things go the way they’re planned. Why go down without a fight?”

Five searched Diego’s face, then Klaus’s.

“Do you honestly believe you can take her by yourself?” Klaus asked Five. “I’m asking. Seriously. I don’t know. You’re a master assassin, maybe you can.”

But Five knew. He looked away.

“I’m just saying, we need to prepare for the worst possible option,” Klaus continued.

Five looked up again, his nerves steeled. “Worst possible option, huh?”

“Let’s gather the Umbrella Academy,” Diego said dramatically. “We have an apocalypse to stop.”

“Jeez, are you sure your acting chops aren’t being wasted as part of the fuzz?” Klaus said, holding back laughter.

Diego rolled his eyes. “I was trying to be serious, this is serious.”

“Yeah, alright,” Klaus said, slapping Diego on the back. “I call Ben.”

Chapter Text

Since Klaus called Ben, Diego took Luther, and Five got Allison.

Klaus walked to Ben’s house, and tried to prevent himself from getting too wound up.

“Just apologize and explain the situation to him. Just apologize and explain the situation to him…” Klaus told himself over and over. When he arrived he knocked on the door, but there was no response. Klaus knocked louder, and then banged on the door.

“Aw, fuck it,” he said to himself. He opened the door and called out for Ben.

“Ben! Ben, I’m sorry! Ben!!!” He went through the rooms of the house, stepping over piles of laundry and ignoring the state of things.

He opened the door to a darkened room, and saw something moving under the covers of a bed. Klaus was silent, and he heard someone making that wobbly noise you make when you’re inhaling and trying not to cry.

“Ben?” he asked.

“Leave me alone!” Ben cried.

“Ben… I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“Sorry for what?!” Ben cried again. “You didn’t do anything wrong! I’m the one who freaked out and split everyone up!”

“You’re wrong. It was my fault. But that doesn’t matter. Look, a lot has happened since that whole incident and we need you.”

Ben sat up and looked at him darkly. “You don’t need me.”

“Yes we do. Vanya’s a double agent for the Commission. She’s going to cause the apocalypse on purpose. You’re the most powerful member of the Academy and we need you in case of a fight,” Klaus said as he walked over to Ben and sat down next to him on the bed.

“I-- I can’t control the Horror. If I let it out it will attack anyone and everyone.”

“You can control it, Ben. I know you can.”

“No you don’t. And if I could then--”

“Hey, woah, hey. You’re not responsible for that. You couldn’t control it then, but I know you can now. I mean, if you really couldn’t control the Horror as a kid, wouldn’t we all be dead? If we really were superheroes you must’ve let it out to fight bad guys, right?”

“I guess…”

“Look, dad locked me in a mausoleum to try and get me over my fear of ghosts. God knows what he did to get you to control the Horror, and how it’s affecting you now. All I know is, you gotta let go of that fear. You gotta realize that the Horror comes out of a portal in YOUR stomach, and you can control that portal and the beast within it.”

“I don’t have time--!”

“No one has the time, Ben. We don’t have the time. We have to stop Vanya in two days, or that’s it.”

“What if bringing me is a mistake?”

“The mistake would be leaving you behind.” Klaus cringed inwardly at himself for how cheesy that was, but then he smiled. Like brother, like brother.

Ben looked away.

“C’mon Ben. We need the full power of the Academy for this. I don’t know what threats we’ve stopped before, but I don’t think we’ve ever stopped an apocalypse.”

“Well…”

“And if we don’t save the world, we’re never gonna get to have family game night! We’re never gonna have painfully awkward family reunions, we’re never gonna have Thanksgiving dinner together… you know, all the things families on TV do!”

Ben rolled his eyes. “Can you even cook a turkey?”

“No, but I make a mean cranberry sauce.”

“From a can?”

“That’s besides the point. So are ya in?”

Ben smiled beside himself. “Fine. I’m in.”

~~~

Diego pressed the buzzer with the label that read “Henry Mellcot” and waited for an answer.

“Hello?” a voice said through the intercom.

“Hey, is this Henry?”

“Yeah, who am I speaking to?”

“This is Diego. One of Luther’s brothers. Is he home?”

There was an awkward pause.

“No, uh, he’s not here right now.”

“Are you lying?”

“Excuse me?”

“I think you’re lying. Look man, just tell Luther that we need to talk. Things have gotten complicated. And uh… we need him.”

Diego heard some muffled movement over the intercom.

“Hi,” Luther said bashfully.

“Hey, big guy!” Diego said. “Come on down, wouldya? We gotta talk.”

“Well, alright.”

Luther went downstairs and Diego got him up to speed.

“Vanya’s a double agent?” Luther asked, completely shocked.

“Yeah.”

“She’s been lying to us this whole time.”

“Uh, yeah.”

“Gosh, I can’t believe someone would just cause the apocalypse on purpose.”

“Well, she’s brainwashed. She hates us.”

“Why?”

“I’m kinda unclear on the details, but I think we were dicks to her as kids.”

“How does she even know that? Were we?”

“I dunno, but look. The important thing is we need to convince her to not destroy the world, and we need to assemble the Academy. You in?”

“Hell yeah.”

~~~

Instead of going to Allison’s mansion, Five went back to the Royal Inn. He didn’t want to put his siblings in danger if he didn’t have to. Standing outside the hotel room, he pressed his hands into fists and they glowed blue. If anything went wrong… he could get out.

“Vanya?” Five asked out loud as he entered.. “It’s Five! I’m back…”

Five entered the room Vanya was staying in and saw her staring wistfully out the window at the city.

“Did you go to the Commission?” She asked, not turning around.

“Yes. I know what you plan on doing.”

“Mm.”

“What did she tell you?” Five asked. “That you’re doing the right thing? Preserving the correct timeline? That the Commission does righteous work? Because it doesn’t. I know she told you we’re all a bunch of assholes--”

“You are an asshole.”

“Maybe, but I’m an asshole who cares about his family,” Five took a few steps towards Vanya.

“Really?!” Vanya said, whipping around. “Because she told me how you all treated me. No, she didn’t just tell me, she SHOWED me, on the infinite switchboard! You don’t care about me, you just care about your oh-so-special siblings!”

“Then she didn’t show you everything. She didn’t show you our birthdays, when I snuck all of us out to Griddy’s. She didn’t show you that time you caught the flu and I snuck into your room to bring you tea. She didn’t show you our mini-concerts, where you’d play violin and I’d accompany you on piano. Dad was the one who orchestrated your separation.”

“By the end you all were old enough to know better. After you left they all shunned me worse than before.”

Five looked at the ground. “You’re right. We could’ve treated you better. Should’ve. But that’s not a reason to destroy the world.”

Vanya didn’t seem to hear him. “I wonder what would’ve happened if you didn’t find out I had powers. Would you have come for me? Would you have included me?”

“Yes, I would’ve!”

“Would they?”

“They don’t know any different. Vanya… they’re not the kids they once were. They literally don’t remember treating you badly, but that’s not important. You can fight with me about that later, what matters now is you don’t destroy the world.”

“I have to. It’s my duty. It’s what I was made for.”

“What you were made for?”

“Like I said, the Handler showed me. She showed me aborted timelines, how you all still treated me like shit, even as adults, and how I blew up the moon. She showed me causing the apocalypse again and again.”

“That can’t be the full story.”

“I’m going to cause the apocalypse, Five. There’s nothing you can do to stop me. There’s nothing I can do to stop me.”

“Do you really thing everyone on the entire fucking planet deserves to die?”

“It’s not about deserving to die, Five! If I don’t cause the apocalypse now, I’ll cause it some other time.”

“Don’t you believe in free will?”

“Would you, if you saw yourself causing the apocalypse on four separate occasions?”

“You think that just because the Handler showed you a handful of timelines where you destroyed the world, every timeline has you destroying the world?”

“It’s the only way.”

“It’s not.”

“It IS!” Vanya cried, eyes suddenly glowing. She swiped her hand out and a wave of white light came from it, hitting Five in the chest, knocking him to the ground. He got up, prepared to fight her.

“You think you can fight me?” Vanya said with a smile. “While dear old dad spent 13 years suppressing my powers, the Handler spent 12 teaching me to be as powerful as possible.”

Five blinked right up next to her and managed to punch her face, but then she sent him up into the air using an energy tentacle and suspended him against the wall so he couldn’t move a muscle. She then opened the window and flew out of the hotel. After she was too far away, the energy tentacle disappeared, and Five fell onto one of the beds. He looks out the window for Vanya and doesn’t see her. He looked up and spotted the roof, and blinked onto it to try and get a better look, but Vanya was gone. Perhaps she went back down to the ground and hid amongst the foot traffic. Five blinked back to the hotel room. Vanya left all her stuff in the room. Not that it mattered much, after Vanya caused the apocalypse someone from the Commission would likely pick her up in the brink of time to go live there and she wouldn’t need this stuff anymore.

“Fuck,” Five said. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” There was a growing assembly of snakes in his gut. He fucked up, only made her more sure of the Commission’s plans, and lost her. Now he didn’t know what to do besides follow Klaus and Diego’s plans. He wasn’t entirely comfortable with the fact that the fate of the world rested in their minds.

~~~

Five rang the doorbell outside Allison’s mansion. It wasn’t as big as Reginald’s, but it was a lot more stylish.

Suddenly an intercom buzzed to life.

“Who is it?” an unknown male voice said. Five assumed that this must be Allison’s secret husband.

“It’s Five. One of Allison’s brothers,” Five said. “I’ve come to… apologize… and ask for her help.”

“Uh, one minute.”

There was a moment of silence, and Five crossed his arms.

“Five?” Allison’s voice came, slightly shakily, from over the intercom.

“Hi,” Five said. “So uh, I’m back. Can you let me in?”

“Uh, yeah, I’m coming.”

A few moments later, Allison opened the front door, and immediately hugged Five. “Oh thank God you’re okay!” she said.

“I didn’t realize we bonded that much,” Five said, awkwardly letting the embrace happen.

Allison let him go as quickly as she hugged him. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what got into me.”

Five didn’t say something along the lines of “you didn’t entirely forget me or at least you didn’t entirely forget that you loved me,” because it was awful hackneyed and also they had bigger fish to fry. Allison led him inside to the sitting room.

“Geez, you really have done well for yourself,” Five said as he looked around. Even though he did grow up in a mansion, and Reginald didn’t mind showing off his wealth, Hargreeves couldn’t be described as “lavish.” Allison, on the other hand, could.

“So, what happened?” Allison asked as she took a seat on a plush armchair. Five got her up to speed and Allison’s face fell as she learned of Vanya’s betrayal.

“You want me to rumor her,” she said emotionlessly.

“You haven’t seemed to have any hang-ups about it in the past,” Five responded, just as dryly.

Allison’s frown became more pronounced. “Yeah, well, I’ve kinda been thinking about that over the last few days…”

Five raised an eyebrow.

“I’m sorry I almost rumored you back in my office.”

“I forgive you,” Five said stiffly.

There was an awkward pause.

“Anyways, we now need to find Vanya and stop her. Klaus and Diego are collecting Ben and Luther. We need all of you to take her down.”

“Why, if you’re just gonna have me rumor her?”

“Well… it’s a last resort.”

Allison nodded. “I’ll come with you. I wanna hear Klaus apologize for himself.”

~~~

Vanya’s eyes fluttered open. There was a crick in her neck and her back hurt. She sat up and stretched a little, and looked around. She was at an empty bus stop, and she couldn’t remember anything about herself except the name “Vanya.” She got up and looked at the sign, and was able to read it, but the alphabet it was written in didn’t feel like the alphabet she was most comfortable with.

A man walked up to the bus stop with a newspaper, sat down, and opened the paper.

“Excuse me?” Vanya asked timidly.

“Ya ne ponimayu,” The man said, confused. “Amerikanets?” he asked, slightly suspiciously.

Somewhere in Vanya’s head was the difference between English and Russian, and her brain switched into Russian mode. “Sorry,” she said. “I was wondering where exactly we are?”

“Vidnoye,” the man replied. “Just south of Moscow. Are you okay, young lady?”

“Is the bus going to Moscow?” Vanya asked. She vaguely knew what Moscow was too. A city in Russia.

“I sure hope so, or I’m going to be late for work,” the man replied.

“Um, okay.” Vanya sat down on the other side of the bench, and waited for the bus to take her to Moscow. She hoped there would be good doctors there to diagnose and help her. Maybe she could find a homeless shelter, too. She didn’t know what else there was to do or where else there was to go. The pockets in her pants were empty.

The bus arrived and took her up to Moscow, and she got off at the same stop as the man, but went the opposite direction. She was in the business district and wandered aimlessly, growing more scared and overwhelmed.

“Vanya!” a voice called out, and Vanya turned to see a woman standing in front of an alleyway. She had gray hair and a stylish, if gaudy, dress.

“Yes?” Vanya replied cautiously.

“It’s okay Vanya, I know who you are,” the woman said with a kind smile (it was a hollow smile, but Vanya didn’t notice it at the time, she was just relieved someone recognized her). “I’m the Handler. Would you like some lunch?”

“Yes please,” Vanya said, returning the Handler’s smile with a genuine one. “Thank goodness I found you, I think I must’ve been in an accident…”

Chapter Text

The Umbrella Academy, minus Vanya, were back together again in the mansion.

“I’m sorry,” Klaus said to Allison and Luther. “I don’t know what came over me, but I shouldn’t have acted like that.”

“I forgive you,” Luther said. Allison nodded in agreement.

“Great,” Five said. “Now that we’re all one happy family again, I, uh, I have some bad news.”

“Five… what did you do?” Klaus asked.

“I went to see Vanya at the hotel. It didn’t go great. She seemed convinced that she’s going to cause the apocalypse no matter what.”

“Why??” Diego asked.

“The Handler showed her a bunch of futures where she caused the apocalypse.”

“Who’s the Handler?”

“Her boss. My former boss. Middle management type.”

Everyone mulled over this new information.

“Well,” Diego continued. “If Vanya really does cause the apocalypse in so many timelines, maybe we should just quit while we’re ahead.”

“You do have that briefcase,” Klaus said. “We could all go to the past and live out the rest of our lives there. Or maybe we could take Vanya to the past! Or the future!”

“Yeah!” Diego chimed in. “How’s she gonna cause the apocalypse on April first if she isn’t there? We just grab her and use the time-machine briefcase to take her to April second! Bada bing bada boom, problem solved!”

“No, you idiot. Then she’ll just cause the apocalypse on April 2nd. If there are already a bunch of aborted timelines where the world ends on different days, like she kind of implied, changing the date of the apocalypse isn’t going to solve anything.”

“Damn,” Diego said, “I really thought I was onto something…”

“Well, you know her best, Five,” Allison said. “How do we get her to change her mind?”

“I don’t know,” Five replied, “The Handler changed her. My only lead right now is for you to apologize to her.”

“Why would we apologize to her?”

“Is it because we were dicks to her as kids?” Luther asked.

“Uh, yeah, pretty much,” Five said. “She hates our guts.”

“You really think an ‘I’m sorry,’ is gonna stop her?” Ben asked.

“No, but it’s a start.”

“What exactly did we do to her?” Allison asked.

Five sighed. “I guess I’ll start at the beginning,” and he explained Allison’s rumor, her systematic exclusion from their childhoods, and the complex Vanya developed. The five of them had varying degrees of knowledge on this issue, and Five watched as their faces got more shocked, horrified, and ashamed.

“Well, it’s really Hargreeves’s fault,” Diego huffed.

“It is…” Klaus said, “but if we really continued to treat her that way until we were 17…””

“Then it’s our fault too,” Allison said solemnly.

“We should go apologize to her pronto,” Luther said.

“We need more of a plan than that,” Diego retorted. “Look at how Five’s apology went.”

“Well?” Ben said, looking at Five. “What do we do if we apologize and she’s still bent on destroying the world?” The rest looked at Five too.

“Well, we’re gonna have to convince her that her destiny isn’t real.”

~~~

“What if we went back in time and intercepted Vanya before the Commission found her? We know she was dropped off in Moscow,” Luther offered.

“Moscow is a huge city. We’re supposed to scour all of it?” Allison asked.

“What if we took her back in time to before the moon was created!” Klaus cried excitedly.

“No oxygen,” Five replied, shooting that down. “Also the ground might’ve still been lava.”

“What if we took her to the moon?” Ben said quietly. It was the first thing he said since the brainstorming session started.

“Can the briefcase do that?” Allison asked.

“I don’t know,” Five said. “Also, still no oxygen!”

“The hotel,” Ben said. “We use the briefcase to take her to the hotel. There should be air in the prison right?”

Five’s brain shot off like a rocket.

“So then what?” Diego asked. “We imprison her?”

“Well, we try to reason with her first. If she blows up the moon while she’s on it there’s a greater chance she’ll die before the Commission can save her, right Five?”

“Mm.”

“Ben, you’re a fucking genius!” Klaus cried, hugging his brother. “See! Aren’t you glad you came?”

Ben nodded.

“So, Five, do you think the hotel can really trap her?” Klaus asked brightly. “In case of emergency, of course.”

“Mm.”

“The hell does ‘mm’ mean?”

“Mm.”

Diego shook Five’s shoulders. “Are you even listening?”

Five looked up, but seemingly past everyone and everything in the room, and then blinked out.

“Ugh! Annoying little shit,” Klaus said jokingly.

“Where the hell did he go?!” Allison asked.

“Probably to that workshop room where he left the briefcase. C’mon, I’ll show you.”

Klaus led the others towards the workshop, but Five suddenly went past them in a hurry, so they turned and followed him to the hidden computer room.

“Woah…”

“What is this place?”

“Why does Reginald have a hidden 1940s computer in his house?”

Five ignored all their comments and questions, and plugged the briefcase into the computer.

“What are you doing?” Klaus asked.

“No moon coordinates on the briefcase. I want to download the coordinates of the hotel from the computer.”

“Damn, that’s smart.”

“Thanks,” Five said, and he flashed Klaus a smile. Five finished plugging the briefcase in and set it down.

“Okay, how many of you actually have experience in self-defense?” Five asked. He assumed that Vanya got the standard Commission training and therefore had some sort of combat skills.

Predictably, Diego and Luther raised their hands. Allison did too.

“Really?” Klaus asked.

“What? I took self-defense and MMA classes. A girl’s gotta protect herself.”

“You are just full of surprises.”

Five turned to Klaus and Ben. Klaus suddenly felt a little useless among his siblings. This feeling wasn’t entirely foreign. His powers weren’t that useful in a straight fight.

“Ben… how well can you control the Horror?” Five asked.

Klaus immediately zipped his lips. He already spilled the murderous secrets of one siblings, and he wasn’t about to do it again.

“Not well,” Ben admitted quietly. “How well could I control it in the past?”

“Well, at the beginning we all had to evacuate before you let the Horror out on someone, but by the end of my time at home you were able to control it a little better, and could direct the tentacles at our enemies.”

Suddenly a memory was sparked in Klaus. “Oh! That reminds me. Did we ever fight supervillains? I think Aaron mentioned a conductor? And a murder magician?”

Five raised an eyebrow. “Like a train conductor? Or an orchestra conductor?”

Klaus paused. “I… don’t know. Did we ever fight either of those?”

“Not to my knowledge,” Five said. “We mostly fought normal criminals and did espionage.”

This made Klaus a lot less anxious.

“Of course, I was only part of the Academy as part of our crime-fighting team for… 6 months? I forget exactly how long… anyways, it kept going for another 4 years after I left. Maybe a bunch of crazy supervillains came out of the woodworks once we were established.”

This made Klaus a lot more anxious.

“Wait, hold on,” Allison said. “So you’re telling me there’s a possibility that if we go to this hotel, there are a bunch of supervillains there who hate us because we beat all of them as high schoolers?”

“Well, that’s only a problem if they recognize you.”

“You recognized us,” Klaus pointed out.

“Well I spent 13 years looking at your ugly mugs, and dad did make us wear partial face masks when we were in public, so there’s a good chance they might not.”

“Is it really worth the risk?” Allison asked. “What if Vanya lets them out?”

“Look,” Five said. “There’s nowhere else on Earth we can send her that will prevent her from ending the world. We’re about to have the only briefcase in the world that can go to the moon. If Vanya tries to end the world or fight us once we’re in the hotel, she’s an idiot, because no one is coming to save her.” He paused, considering the fact that the Commission might have access to a rocket (he had never seen one, but the Commission had secrets galore), but even if they did it would take a considerable amount of time to reach the hotel.

“What if,” Ben said quietly, “What if she doesn’t plan on surviving?”

A dead quiet came over the room.

“Five, do you think that this could be a kamikaze mission?” Diego asked, more seriously than Five had ever seen him.

Five thought this over. “I… I don’t think it was meant to be,” he replied. “The Commission doesn’t usually do that… but I dunno, maybe they prepared her for the possibility that the worst happens.”

Suddenly Diego’s eyes lit up. “Five, remember our conversation at the diner? What if they’re planning on us trying to take her to the moon?”

“What?” Luther asked.

“It’s kind of complicated,” Five said, “Basically we figured out that the Commission calculated me coming back to 2019 and planned accordingly. Thanks for reminding me. That being said, the energy beam I saw definitely came from Earth to hit the moon, so if we get Vanya on the moon we have a chance of winning. Of course, for all we know, Vanya might be expecting our moon plan…”

“So we don’t have surprise on our side,” Allison said. “That would’ve been nice to know earlier. Also, wouldn’t that mean that the Commission probably has a briefcase that can go to the moon?”

“Possibly, I don’t know,” Five replied. “The Commission can be kind of short sighted. According to them we don’t make it to the moon, so why bother?”

Nobody had a good answer for that.

“Anyways,” Five continued, “time to ask some questions and run some tests.”

~~~

They found Grace dusting bookshelves in the library. More precisely, they found her holding a duster and throwing a book about the history of the modern Olympics into a small pile on the floor, before starting to dust the rest of that shelf.

“Why are you throwing those books into a pile?” Klaus asked innocuously.

“Because they were Reggie’s favorite, darling, and I do not wish to see them anymore. Don’t worry, I’m going to donate them. No point in destroying them,” Grace said brightly.

Klaus and Five exchanged looks. Five knew Grace, and Klaus knew mental breakdowns. Of course, everyone saw her behavior as concerning.

“Um, I have a question about the Umbrella Academy,” Five said slowly and calmly. “After I left, did the rest of us fight supervillains?”

“Oh yes, quite frequently. Why, there was that escapade in France, that other time with the robots, and that really rather strange thing with Abraham Lincoln, among others.”

“Abraham Lincoln?” Diego asked.

“Well, his statue.”

“And what happened when they defeated them?” Five asked, before another one of his dumbass siblings could ask irrelevant questions.

“Reggie sent them to Hotel Oblivion. Of course, a replica statue of Lincoln had to be made.”

“Okay, thanks,” Five said, and he ushered his siblings out.

“Well fuck,” Five said, once in the hallway.

“Mm,” Diego concurred.

“Either way, sending her to the moon is our best bet,” Five continued. “It’s our best shot at stopping Vanya long enough to convince her this is a bad idea, and if somehow those other supervillains get out, we’ll fight them too. You all beat them without me, so with me we will definitely be able to take them down.”

“Are you sure there isn’t a better way?” Luther asked. “What if we just take her to the opposite side of the world of the moon so she can’t blast it.”

“For all we know she can curve her blasts, or who’s to say she just won’t shoot a beam straight through the Earth?” Five retorted.

“What if she destroys the Earth from the moon?” Allison asked.

“Look, Allison, it’s a risk we’re gonna have to take. At least we’ll all be alive.”

“Yeah, there’s no way to plan for every eventuality,” Diego agreed. “I’m with Five and Ben. Taking her to the moon is our best option.”

“Same,” Klaus added.

Luther and Allison looked at each other, and Allison racked her brain for a better idea.

“I’m in,” she said.

“Me too.”

“Great,” Five said, “Because we’ve got a lot of work to do.”

Chapter Text

Five split his siblings into teams. Diego, Luther, and Allison were in charge of figuring out everything they could about Hotel Oblivion from Reginald’s documents. It would be difficult since they still hadn’t cracked the code, but they could work on that while they looked at schematics. He tasked Klaus with helping Ben learn to control the Horror as best he could, and also gave them some training videos and a projector from when they were kids. Five put himself on briefcase duty. The coordinates had been downloaded into the briefcase, and now he had to test it.

With some help from Grace, he found Luther’s old spacesuit from that trip to the moon when they were kids. Luther was a bit taller than Five at the time, but the suit fit well enough, and Five figured it could keep him alive for a brief amount of time, at least. He suited up, and went into the main room where Luther, Diego, and Allison were (Klaus and Ben were in one of the old training spaces, and Five didn’t want to go back there unless he had to).

“Hey,” Five said, to grab their attention. “So I didn’t mention this earlier, but along with programming locations into the briefcases, you can program timers. This briefcase is set to take me to the lobby of Hotel Oblivion in exactly 1 minute, and then bring me back to this exact spot 30 seconds later.”

“What do we do if you don’t come back?” Allison asked.

“Keep going with the plans to stop Vanya,” Five said. “Don’t worry about me.”

“Ok.”

There was an awkward pause, and then Five disappeared in a blue portal.

“What are we actually doing if he doesn’t return?” Diego asked.

“I’m going to find Vanya and make the Commission bring him back,” Allison said through gritted teeth.

“Damn, I didn’t realize you cared about him that much already.”

“Yeah, me neither…” Allison replied, eyes glued to the spot that Five vanished from.

~~~

If you had told Five approximately five seconds ago that anything his father owned could be described as “dilapidated” he would not have been inclined to believe you. Of course now, standing in the lobby of Hotel Oblivion, Five could not think of a better descriptor.

The lobby was entirely empty of all signs of live save himself, and was deathly quiet. Everything was covered in a layer of dust and dirt. The red carpet he was standing on still had some plushness to it, but desperately needed a deep cleaning. The lobby was windowless and not very big (it was about the size of two bedrooms), and it felt rather suffocating. Above the concierge there was a sign that read “WELCOME TO HOTEL OBLIVION.” Five had never felt more unwelcome anywhere.

The eeriness was soon trumped by the fact that there were no windows, and thus no way to prove he was on the moon. He went for the double wooden doors to his right, and pushed and pulled them to no avail. Gripping the briefcase tightly, he blinked 1 foot in front of the door, onto the surface of the moon. Several dozen feet in front of him he saw a glassy reflection, and he realized that the hotel was in a giant bubble. Noting that he had very little time left before returning to Earth, he loosened his helmet, and after an initial sucking of air, everything was fine. The bubble kept the air in. Right before he could continue to explore, he was suddenly sucked away by the briefcase, back to the Hargreeves mansion.

~~~

“So?” Allison asked, as soon as he returned. The look on his siblings' faces were all the same, and screamed curiosity.

“It’s real,” he replied. “There’s a hotel on the moon sealed in a bubble.”

“Yeah we just figured that out. The boundary to be several feet thick and chemically enhanced,” Diego said.

“So… we’re going to the moon?” Luther asked.

“Yep.”

“I can’t believe I’m going to the moon.”

“It’s your second time, you know,” Five said, before exiting the room.

“I’m sorry WHAT?” Diego yelled as Five left. He then turned to Luther. “How come you got to go to the moon?”

“I dunno, why are you asking me??”

~~~

Several minutes earlier, Klaus and Ben made their way to a big, open gymnasium with padded floors and padding halfway up the walls, as per Five directions and description. After entering and looking around, Klaus stood, silent and thoughtful.

“So how are we gonna do this?” Ben asked nervously.

“In small steps.”

“Small steps? The Horror is either in or it’s out, Klaus. There are no small steps.”

“What if you only let out one tentacle at a time?”

Ben thought this over, and Klaus saw the fear and uncertainty in his eyes. “I don’t know if I can.”

“Well, you gotta try.” Klaus walked behind Ben. “Just focus, and only open the portal enough for one tentacle to come through.”

“How do you know that’s gonna work?”

“I don’t! Our powers couldn’t be more different! All I know is that focus and attention are needed to control my powers, so maybe you need focus and attention too.”

Ben nodded. “Okay, I guess that makes sense.”

There was a pause.

“So… are you gonna do it?” Klaus asked slowly.

“I’m just-- focusing.”

“Ok, whenever you’re ready.”

15 seconds passed.

“Do you want me to count you off?”

“Yes please.”

“Three, two--”

“No, don’t start at three. That’s not enough.”

“Five? Ten?”

“Ten.”

“Okay. Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one.”

Nothing happened.

“Ben!”

“You didn’t say ‘go!’ I should’ve specified I wanted you to say go.”

“Five, four, three, two, one, go!”

Ben cried out and for a split second one tentacle lashed out, before almost immediately retracting.

Ben whirled around.

“I did it.”

“You did it!” Klaus cried happily.

“I did it!”

“Let’s do it again!”

Ben repeated this several more times, until he could do it without a countdown.

“Okay, now you need to do it for a little longer than that,” Klaus said, when he thought Ben had enough reps in.

“Longer?”

“Yes.”

Klaus saw some doors on one of the walls, and hoping it was a supply closet, opened the doors. It was a supply closet. There was an obscene amount of knives and swords, as well as dummies and other weapons. Klaus took a dummy and placed it about 40 feet away from Ben, and then walked over to him.

“Ok, I want you to reach out one tentacle, and hit the dummy. Direct where it goes.”

“I can’t direct the Horror.”

“Ben, you need to let go of that thought. You can control the Horror.” Klaus said this mighty convincingly, despite not being sure it was true.

Ben’s face turned to one of focus, as he turned back around. “Hit the mannequin. Hit the mannequin…” he said to himself. “Okay.”

“Do you want another countdown?”

“No. When we fight Vanya I won’t have any countdowns.”

“Okay.”

Ben opened the portal and one tentacle shot out, but then it started thrashing around, out of control. It did hit the dummy, but clearly only by accident.

“Klaus! It’s trying to get the others to come out!!”

“Then retract it!!”

The tentacle retracted back through the portal.

Ben turned and looked at Klaus defeated. “I’m never gonna be able to master this by the day after tomorrow.”

“You don’t need to master it. You just need to be… intermediate.”

The look on Ben’s face said he thought that even achieving intermediate status was impossible, but at least he didn’t say it out loud.

“C’mon,” Klaus said, “try again.”

Ben took a deep breath. “Alright. Trying again.”

~~~

Vanya took a bite of her sandwich, and couldn’t help but feel a little weird. The Handler had only ordered a sparkling water, and she sipped it with a smile on her face as she stared at Vanya.

“So,” Vanya said after she swallowed, “You worked with my father? That’s how you know me?”

“Yes, well, your adoptive father. He adopted you and six other children because you’re special, but I don’t want to get into that too much now. Tell me, what do you remember?”

“Nothing,” Vanya replied. “Just my name.” This was true, from the right angle. She didn’t remember any events, per say, before waking up at the bus stop. But she remembered something. Fear. Loneliness. Hate. Inferiority. And above all, Ordinary. “And what do you mean by special? I’m not special.”

“Yes you are, dear. But let’s wait until we get to my office before we discuss that.”

After lunch, The Handler took Vanya to an empty alley.

“I thought we were going to your office?” Vanya asked.

“Yes, well, I suppose I must explain some things now,” The Handler replied. She explained briefcases and time travel, and the fact that her office existed in the 1950s. Vanya was obviously quite shocked.

“I must warn you,” The Handler added, “Traveling by briefcase can be a bit nauseating at first,” she then held out her hand, and Vanya took it. In the flash of blue, they were suddenly in a very well decorated office.

~~~

As Five took off the spacesuit and put it back into storage, his mind mulled over his plans. Taking Vanya to the moon seemed about as foolproof as he was gonna get, but of course, he needed to find Vanya in order for that to work, and they were losing time, fast. He reluctantly went back up to his siblings.

“Diego,” Five said in the doorway. “I need you.”

“What for?” Diego asked, putting down a chart and looking up at him.

“We need to find Vanya, preferably without her noticing us.”

Diego nodded. “How long ago did you last see her?”

“It’s been about two hours.”

“Any ideas where she might have gone? Would she stay in the city?”

Five paused for a moment. “I don’t know. Luther, Allison, keep working. Diego, let’s go to dad’s office.”

~~~

“We need surveillance footage,” Five said. “You need to go back to the precinct and look for her.”

“I can’t,” Diego said. “I’m on a leave of absence right now. One of my colleagues got to Finch and told him I needed a break.”

“Then can we break in? Or hack them somehow?”

“First of all, you’re not going anywhere near the precinct. You’re still wanted by the cops. Second, I don’t know. I’m not the IT guy. Does Hargreeves have any city surveillance?”

“Well, he surveilled us, so, maybe,” Five wondered. “C’mon.”

Five took Diego to the surveillance room, and Five started throwing open cabinets and looking at the labels on the tapes.

“Woah,” Diego said. “So wait, he filmed our whole childhoods?”

“Yeah,” Five said, digging through the piles. There was a quiet in the room and he knew something was wrong. He turned to his brother. “What?”

“So, like, I could see my childhood if I watched these tapes?” Diego asked. There was a sadness in his eyes.

“Trust me, you don’t want to do that.”

“Maybe I do. You don’t know what it’s been like for me-- for us.”

“I know that, but our childhoods weren’t exactly the greatest.”

“I don’t care. I don’t care that Hargreeves was a shithole or that I’m gonna see myself being an asshole to my traitor sister. I want to know what I was like, who I was, before…”

“You’re lucky,” Five said. “You all got to be new people and live good lives.”

Diego looked away. “Look, I know your life sucked, but it’s not like we lived magically perfect lives because of Hargreeves. All I’ve wanted from the moment I woke up was to know who I was before.”

Five took a deep breath. “You know Diego, if you want to watch the tapes, be my guest. But I’d prefer you do it after we, you know, save the world.”

Diego didn’t have a counter to that. “Alright… what should I be looking for?”

“I don’t know exactly, look at the labels,” Five replied. “Look at this tape,” he held up a tape that had “KITCHEN - 04/16/1999” written on it. “This tape shows the kitchen on April 16th, 1999. Look for ones that have labels that aren’t rooms in our house.”

Diego rolled his eyes, then paused. “Our house?”

Five froze, realizing that Diego still didn’t see the mansion this way. “Uh--”

“Nevermind,” Diego added quickly. He threw open a cabinet and started looking at tapes.

~~~

Ben threw the dummy up in the air and caught it again, and then squeezed the dummy until it exploded. He then brought the tentacle back in and turned to Klaus with a big smile.

“Ben! That was awesome!”

“Hell yeah it was!”

“Okay, do you think you’d be good to let two tentacles out now?”

Ben’s face immediately fell.

“C’mon, I know you can do it.”

“I thought we were only trying to get me to intermediate,” Ben retorted.

Klaus sighed sharply. “Okay, fine. Let’s take a break and watch the training videos Five gave us.”

Ben nodded along. “Yeah,” he added, with a slightly nervous tinge in his voice, “let’s make sure you’re not totally useless when we go to fight Vanya.”

~~~

“Five,” Diego said, with some urgency in his voice.

“Yeah?”

“Look,” he held out a tape. “Intsc. 5th & Douglass, February 9th, 2010.” The intersection of 5th and Douglass was a block away from the infamous bank, and fairly far from the mansion. and Five’s face lit up, and the two dug through a pile of tapes labelled “Intsc 5th & Douglass” with various dates, ranging from 2000 to 2017.

“Do you think it still works?” Diego asked.

“I dunno,” Five replied, getting up and dusting himself off. “Let’s go find out.”

“We can’t just disappear and leave everyone here.”

Five rolled his eyes. “Jesus Christ, okay. We’ll let Allison and Luther know where we’re going.”

~~~

After that, the pair got into Diego’s car and drove to the intersection. Diego parked his car on the street and reached over to the glove box and pulled out his badge, and then stuck it in his jacket pocket.

“Stay in the car,” Diego said.

“Excuse me, what?”

“In case anyone sees me and asks what I’m doing. I want to have plausible deniability. You look like a kid, remember? You can’t be climbing around places, someone will call the cops on you.”

Five really didn’t like it but he knew Diego was right (that doesn’t mean he has to admit it out loud). “Fine.”

Diego got out of the car, and Five watched him walk to the corner. They both saw the security camera at the same time, affixed to the corner of an office building. Diego went inside, and after a few minutes, Five saw him open the window next to the camera and fiddle with it for a second. He then pulled out some kind of tool and opened the camera, and pulled out a tape. He took the tape, closed the window, and within a few minutes was back at the car.

“Let’s go back to the house and check this tape,” Diego said.

~~~

Both brother’s faces dropped in disappointment as they sped through the tape. The recording stopped on February 9th, 2019. Diego turned to Five as the screen went black.

“What now?” he asked. “Do we search the city for cameras in the hopes that some are up to date?”

“I wouldn’t bother,” Five said. “If Dad was losing it enough at the end to forget this tape, he probably wasn’t changing out the tapes on any of the others.”

“You really think he was losing it?” Diego asked. “I mean, he seemed perfectly put together when Klaus summoned him,” he said with a shiver.

Five thought this over. “I don’t know.”

There was a quiet pause.

“There must be some other way of tracking her,” Five said. “You’re a cop. You must have something.”

“Without access to the station I’m not sure what we can do.”

“Let’s assemble everyone back in the living room,” Five said. “Who knows, maybe one of those idiots will have an idea.”

~~~

The idiots, once assembled, were not quick with coming up with an idea.

“What if we went door-to-door?” Luther asked. “And asked people if they saw someone matching Vanya’s description? I mean, if she really flew out of a window someone must’ve seen it.”

Five shrugged. “Probably, but it was downtown. Who knows where the people that saw it went.”

“Is there any way we could use Allison’s rumor?” Ben asked. Everyone turned to Allison.

“If someone doesn’t know something I can’t change that,” Allison replied. “Trust me on this, I’ve dealt with enough customers who think their spouse is hiding something.”

“Maybe we’re going about this the wrong way,” Klaus said. “We know two things. Vanya was emotional when she flew off, and the mind wipe didn’t clear away everything. Five, is there any place in the city Vanya would go if she was in need of comfort?”

Five’s jaw dropped with clarity. “Griddy’s.”

Chapter Text

“Absolutely no fucking way,” Diego said.

“Yeah, Five,” Klaus added. “After what happened last time? We’re not letting you go alone.”

“Didn’t you say she wanted our apologies?” Allison asked.

Five could think of a million retorts but he had trouble deciding which one should be the first to come out of his mouth, and several spilled out at once. “We don’t want to overwhelm her. Your apologies won’t actually mean anything. We shouldn’t leave the house unguarded.”

“Pogo and Grace will still be here,” Klaus said.

“And clearly you don’t know how much an apology means,” Allison added, crossing her arms.

“We’re all going to the moon, ain’t we?” Ben said. “How dangerous could some donut shop be?”

“Uh, yeah, if she is there are we gonna take her to the moon now?” Klaus interjected.

“Are we prepared for that?” Luther asked nervously.

“We’re not,” Five said, through gritted teeth. “We don’t know nearly enough about Hotel Oblivion. I need to do more recon first.”

“Wait, then why are we going after her?” Diego asked.

“I say if we get the chance to take her, we should,” Allison said.

“Five does have a point,” Ben noted. “We don’t know anything about the air supply up there, or how much of a pounding the bubble can take.”

“Well we can’t wait forever,” Diego retorted. “Vanya isn’t just gonna sit around at Griddy’s, if she even went there in the first place.”

“We shouldn’t go in there without a plan--” Luther said.

“Well duh!”

“You didn’t let me finish--”

“Five, what if there’s ghosts there?” Klaus asked quietly, turning to where his brother had been standing, but the boy was gone.

“What do you mean ‘what if there’s ghosts there?’” Diego asked. “It’s an abandoned hotel on the moon.”

~~~

Klaus had never told this story to anyone.

Not to Enrico when they were sharing their darkest secrets.

Not to his therapist when he was telling her his deepest fears.

Not to Aaron, even after telling him about his powers.

No one.

He wasn’t sure it was real. Now that he knew more about his past he hoped to God it wasn’t.

It happened early, maybe only a year or two after he woke up, he was fairly sure of that. The timeline of those early years are foggy.

It was very late at night and the city was quiet, and Klaus was wandering the streets, coming down from a high. The city had an eerie beauty to it at night, and with the addition of drugs it made the world feel like a different sort of place. He stumbled down the sidewalk, seemingly the only living thing on Earth, when he suddenly heard a bloodcurdling non-human scream.

Klaus turned towards the alley he heard the scream come from and he felt frozen in place. His feet were now a pair of two-ton blocks of steel.

There was a grunting, panting, and growling coming from the darkness of the alley, and the walls of the buildings around him seemed to be turning to stone and closing in. Klaus started hyperventilating. What was it?? A rabid dog? A wolf in the middle of the city? Ghosts didn’t make these kinds of noises, not even the most angry ghosts.

“Gih…” something said, and a claw stretched out into the area illuminated by the streetlight.

“I’ve got nothing to give you,” Klaus squeaked, turning out his pockets. “I’ve got nothing.” He wasn’t sure why he acted like this was a normal mugger.

“Give…”

“I told you, I’ve got nothing,” Klaus repeated. “You want my coat?” Klaus took off his grimy coat and threw it at the darkness, his thin body suddenly feeling the icy wind of the night.

“Give me…”

A face came into the light, a very, very nonhuman face with short tentacles coming out of it.

“A… a… BODY!” the thing lurched out and Klaus screamed as loud as he possibly could, and he felt a firm hand on his shoulder. Klaus turned and saw the mean eyes of a night-shift beat cop staring down at him.

“Well, well, well. How are we feeling tonight, boy?” the cop said.

Klaus whipped his head around, and looked for the monster he was beginning to suspect was the ghost of a monster.

“Arrest me! Detain me! Do what you must but for God’s sake do not leave me here!” Klaus cried out.

“If you say so… druggie…” the cop said, pulling out handcuffs and shoving Klaus into the back of the squad car. Klaus sat quietly in the back of the car and shivered all the way to the station, trying to soak up as much of the car’s heating as he could. He didn’t tell the cops the truth, of course, and as soon as he got out he went on the bender to end all benders. It was one of the worst nights of his life. He didn’t need it topped.

~~~

Vanya wept, and then cried out, throwing her fists onto the Infinite Switchboard, which crackled with electricity but didn’t break. The Handler put her hand gently on Vanya’s shoulder.

“I know, I know darling,” she said.

Vanya whipped around, her eyes red, but turning white. “Let’s go. Let’s go get them, make them pay for how they treated me,” she cried.

The Handler grabbed both of Vanya’s shoulders and steadied her. “No. We must be more careful than that. The world has just undergone a massive amnesia blast and your father is cleaning up the last remaining crumbs. The world is delicate right now. You’re delicate.”

“I don’t care!” Vanya said, brushing the Handler’s hands off her shoulders as violently as possible. “You can time travel! Let’s go back to the day he and Allison made me think I was ordinary and make them change!”

“You think I haven’t tried to change the past?” The Handler asked, her face growing dark. “I have, child. I sent two associates to try and get him to change his mind about certain decisions, but he disposed of them. Your father is powerful, more powerful than you, but only by so much. It’s why he feared you.”

“Then let ME fight him instead of two idiot ‘associates!’”

“Can you fight??” The Handler cried out. “The rest of your siblings will still have the fighting instincts burned into their minds. If they came to your father’s aid, which they surely will, you don’t stand a chance alone! I am going to train you, and prepare you for the revenge you desire, and it will be glorious.”

Vanya looked down, still breathing shakily.

“Let me show you your room,” The Handler said. “It’s a very nice room, and much bigger than your old one.”

The Handler showed Vanya to her new living quarters, and asked if she wanted a tour of the Commission now or later. Vanya chose later, and the Handler left. Vanya then went to her bed and cried. She was an unloved outcast misplaced in time in a foreign and scary place. Everything felt very overwhelming at the moment, and she wasn’t sure how to release those emotions.

And then she saw a violin case in the corner.

~~~

“Where’d that little shit go,” Diego said, turning around.

“To Griddy’s, you idiot,” Allison responded. “Let’s go.”

The five adults rushed out the mansion and to Griddy’s (all of them feeling a different amount of conspicuous and embarrassed as they ran down the steet), and when they got there, they saw Five inside, behind Vanya. Both of them were facing away from the windows.

~~~

“Hi,” Five said carefully. He noted Vanya was eating a boston creme donut and drinking a hot chocolate, her go-to order on their birthday.

“How did you find me?” Vanya said, not turning around.

“You remember this place,” Five responded enigmatically. By his tone Vanya couldn’t tell if it was a question or a statement.

“Not really,” she replied. “But it smells familiar.” She took a bite of her donut. “And it tastes familiar.”

“We came here all the time as kids,” Five reminisced. “I’d sneak us all out and we’d eat donuts until we puked.”

“We?” Vanya asked suspiciously. “So I was involved in the donut-puking?”

“Yeah,” Five wanted to elaborate, but he didn’t.

“Why are you here? Are you going to try to convince me not to end the world again?”

“A man’s gotta try.”

Vanya looked at his hands. “You didn’t bring the briefcase.” She looked up at his face intensely. “Are you really going to try to talk me out of it? That isn’t the Five I know.”

Before Five could respond, Vanya’s head turned around out the window, and saw her siblings tensely waiting outside.

“Oh,” she said, slowly standing up. “It’s an ambush.”

“What?” Five said, whipping around, and only getting to see his siblings for half a second before a blast of white energy burst out of Vanya’s chest and sent him flying into the wall. Upon seeing this, the other siblings burst into action. Diego ran straight through the glass mirror, whipped out a knife and hurled it straight at Vanya, but she used an energy beam to send it into the donut rack. Luther followed Diego through the broken window, detached a table from the floor and hurled it at Vanya, who then sent it flying through the ceiling. Five suddenly appeared next to Vanya and solidly punched her in the face. Allison followed her siblings inside and tried to find an opening. Now it was just Klaus and Ben on the sidewalk.

“You gotta unleash a tentacle and grab her,” Klaus said to Ben. “Immobilize her.”

Diego pulled out his gun and fired off three times. The bullets all stopped six inches from Vanya and dropped out of thin air. Luther grabbed a barstool and tried to bash Vanya’s head in, but she swiftly flew out of the way and Luther bashed the countertop instead. Allison tried to start a rumor, but Vanya sent her careening into the wall. Five managed to get in a few more punches, but Vanya was getting better at avoiding even him.

“It’s the only way we can win,” Klaus added. “Look at her. She’s demolishing them.”

Ben looked at his brother, then at his other siblings. He took a deep breath.

“Ok, Klaus,” he said. “I trust you.”

He lifted up his shirt and a tentacle came flying out, through the window, and into Griddy’s, causing immediate chaos. It lashed everywhere, and everyone was scrambling to avoid it while still trying to fight each other. People were screaming and nobody could really see what was going on as diner shrapnel flew everywhere, until Five suddenly blinked outside, and screeched at Ben.

“RETRACT THE FUCKING TENTACLE SHE’S KNOCKED OUT!”

Ben immediately retracted it and everyone stopped moving. Vanya was laying on the floor, eyes closed. Ben stepped back, his face turning white as a sheet.

“Oh my God I killed her--” he said, and he turned, as if to start running.

“You didn’t kill her,” Allison said, coming back out of the restaurant. “You didn’t even hit her. In the chaos I was able to get close to her and rumor her.”

“What did you say?” Five asked, almost accusatorially.

“Just ‘I heard a rumor you fell asleep,’” Allison responded defensively.

“Uh, we should get out of here,” Diego said, coming through the window before Luther, who was carrying Vanya gently.

“Yeah, good idea,” Five said, pulling the briefcase out of a hiding spot in the bushes and setting it. “Grab on.”

Everyone touched the briefcase and they were transported back to the mansion, one second later.

Chapter Text

Luther laid Vanya out on a couch.

“What do we do with her?” Diego asked.

“Why are we still here?” Allison asked. “We just destroyed a donut shop in broad daylight.”

“Should we take her to the moon now?” Luther asked. “And lock her up?”

“That seems kind of cruel,” Klaus responded. “And she won’t exactly be keen to change sides.”

“Wait, how about the basement prison?” Diego said.

“Wait, Hargreeves put a prison in his basement too?” Allison asked, incredulously.

“Did he just build prisons everywhere??” Ben asked.

“No, it’s not a whole prison,” Diego clarified, slightly annoyed. “It’s a room Hargreeves built for Vanya. It contains her powers.”

There was a moment of silence as everyone contemplated this.

“I don’t know…” Klaus said, “Locking her up still seems cruel.”

“Klaus, she might have beaten us in that fight if Ben didn’t release that tentacle,” Allison said. “And it won’t be a surprise next time. Nobody’s saying we should harm her or treat her poorly… but the second she wakes up here she’s going to try to fight her way out, won’t she?”

Klaus didn’t have a solid argument against that, other than the moral argument of “locking people up is wrong.”

“Five, what do you think?” Klaus asked, turning to his brother. In a slight shock to them all, Five was actually still there. He hadn’t blinked off somewhere.

“I don’t know,” Five said quietly. “If we don’t lock her up, she’ll fight her way out the second she wakes up, and if we do she still won’t want to talk to us… and we’ll be no better than dad.”

“What do you mean ‘we’ll be no better than dad?’” Allison asked.

“Remember how I told you dad forced you to rumor Vanya into thinking she was ordinary?” Five asked.

Allison nodded.

“He made you do that while she was locked up in the prison cell made for her. He kept her there for a month and told us all she was sick and needed to be quarantined. He did it because he feared her. If we lock her up then we’re admitting we fear her too.”

“Well then what the fuck were we going to do on the moon?” Diego asked.

“We don’t need to lock her up in a tiny cell once she’s on the moon,” Five retorted, anger growing.

“So she was gonna be a free-range chicken on the moon?” Diego asked sarcastically. “Allowed to roam around the hotel as she pleases?”

“Don’t call Vanya a chicken!”

“You’re the one who’s treating her like a chicken!”

“Maybe we’re overthinking this,” Klaus said loudly but calmly. “I mean, she didn’t immediately go to fight Five, she only attacked him because she thought it was a set up.”

“It kinda was a set up,” Ben said under his breath.

“We were going there to apologize!” Allison cried. “I didn’t go to Griddy’s intent on destroying it and kidnaping my sister. None of us did… I think.”

“You shouldn’t have come anyways,” Five said. “I know Vanya, and I knew all of us being there would lead to that sort of trainwreck.”

There was a moment of silence.

“You went there intending to apologize to me?” Vanya said, leaning up a bit on the couch, her eyes almost thoughtful. Everyone jumped a bit in surprise, and Vanya’s expression fell. “Typical,” she muttered. Then, slowly, she smiled, and chuckled a bit.

“You know what the Handler told me once?” Vanya asked, sitting up.

“What?” Luther asked.

“She told me Sir Hargreeves called you all incompetent all the time. She told me he did that because he wanted to make you a little angry, and drive you all to be the most dangerous, elite versions of yourselves. And while I think that’s true, in a way, I think she was also a little wrong. I think he called you incompetent because you are incompetent.”

“Vanya…” Five interrupted. His voice was somehow tinged with both gentleness and anger. Or maybe it was urgency. “This isn’t you.”

“You don’t know me!” Vanya cried. “You knew a drugged-up version of me 17 years ago!”

“I don’t think that’s true,” Five responded with the authority of a man his age. “The drugs might’ve stifled your emotions and blocked your powers, but they didn’t block the kind of good person that you are.”

Everyone went slightly agog at that statement. It wasn’t the thing Five seemed likely to say. Allison’s eyes darted around the room, and she knew it was her time to intervene.

“And yes, we went there intent on apologizing to you,” she restated.

The silence grew even more uncomfortable. The floor was now given entirely to Vanya. Would she be open to the apology, or send a blast of energy across the room, and fly away?

She looked away from her siblings, whether it was out of remorse or contemplation or anything else, even Klaus couldn’t tell. Then, after a moment, she suddenly looked back up.

“Well?” she asked, “are you going to apologize, or are you gonna stand around telling me you’re ‘intent’ on apologizing?”

“I’m sorry,” Klaus said.

“We’re all sorry for treating you like shit as kids,” Allison added. Luther and Ben both chimed in with a sorry of their own. Only Diego hadn’t offered an olive branch.

“This is stupid,” he said, “I don’t even remember being a dick to you, and Five made it sound like Hargreeves was manipulating all of us. These sorrys are meaningless because ‘we’ didn’t really do the thing you’re upset about, it was some version of us that was erased over a decade ago.”

Five and Allison both turned and gave him seething glares. Klaus had a more gentle approach, and put his hand on his brother’s shoulder.

“Diego, at any other time I would love to talk to you about concepts of the self, but right now fucking apologize to your sister.”

Diego rolled his eyes. “Fine, I’m sorry Vanya.”

“Now, was that so hard?” Klaus asked in a sweet-sarcastic tone.

“Shut up or I’m gonna lob one of Hargreeves’s award statues at your skull.”

Five’s attention moved away from his brothers back to his sister. “See? I told you,” he said to her. “They’re sorry.”

“Well, that’s nice, at least. Some emotional closure before I end the world,” Vanya said, almost as if she was a little sad about what she was going to do.

“Sorry, what?” Luther asked.

“Hold on, I thought apologizing meant she wasn’t gonna end the world,” Diego added.

“I can’t help it,” she said. “The Handler showed me so many timelines where I ended the world. I usually didn’t do it on purpose. Two days from now I’m going to blow up the moon and nothing can stop me.” She said it in such a matter-of-fact way as to be a little unnerving.

“Can’t you just, like, decide not to blow up the moon?” Diego asked.

Vanya shook her head.

“I don’t see why you can’t,” Allison said. “Mind over matter.”

Vanya shrugged. “It’s gonna happen.”

“Hold on,” Klaus interrupted. “In how many of these timelines did you know you were going to cause the end of the world?”

Vanya thought this over. “Well, I mean, none exactly, but in some I knew I caused it before.”

“Wait, how does that work?” Luther asked, but everyone ignored him.

“Ok, why did you cause the end of the world in those timelines?” Klaus continued.

Vanya spent a longer amount of time thinking about this question.

“Vanya?” Klaus asked gently.

“Well… I was always… ostracized… alone… told I was wrong or bad…”

“So every time you ended the world it was like an… emotional outburst?” Ben asked.

“Well, that’s not how I’d put it,” Klaus muttered.

“Y…yeah…” Vanya replied.

“How much did you know your powers?” Ben continued.

“Never very well, thanks to our dad.”

“But you’ve been trained now. You have control over them in this timeline,” Ben said with a smile.

“Yeah, I do,” Vanya answered, with a look on her face that showed she was following Ben’s train of thought.

“So I think you do have control in this timeline. The Handler made the ultimate mistake. She thought she was making you more prepared than ever to end the world but really she was giving you the power not to.”

“It’s not just that. I’m supposed to. I was brought into this world to end it.”

“I stopped believing in destiny a long time ago so someone else should take it from here,” Ben said in a more deadpan tone.

Everyone looked around at each other as if to ask “so do YOU believe in destiny??” until Five felt he had to fill the silence.

“It’s funny,” he said, with a slightly sadistic chuckle. “Everyone’s heads but Vanya’s got filled with the idea that we do have a destiny, thanks to our father. Now she’s the only one who believes in that crap.”

“What do you mean?” Allison asked.

Five sighed. “I mean the old man told us we were born to save the world. Wasn’t until I got to the apocalypse I realized he might’ve been saying that literally, and not just scaring us into cleaning our rooms.”

“It kinda seems like you still do believe that,” Klaus said. “Based on the way you’ve… acted…”

“I don’t believe it’s my destiny to save the world,” Five harrumphed. “I just don’t believe anyone else is gonna do it.”

“I feel like we’re getting a little off topic, guys,” Ben piped up.

Everyone’s attention turned back to Vanya, who seemed to have shrunk a little.

“I…I,” she said, thousands of thoughts behind her eyes.

“You what?” Diego asked, annoyed. “Drama queen,” he whispered under his breath.

“You all don’t understand,” she shot back. “This is what I was told for so long. What I was trained for. My universe-provided mission of ending the world. The world isn’t supposed to go on, it doesn’t deserve to, not with assholes like you all in it.”

“I think we understand better than most,” Five said.

“They don’t.”

Five turned and looked at his other siblings. They didn’t remember Reginald’s lies and manipulation, not with the clarity he did, but at the same time he knew there was more to it.

“I think they do, a little,” Five said slowly, turning back to Vanya. “Luther dropped everything for some guy and a kid who approached him in a parking lot. Diego did things that will probably result in him getting fired or even put in jail himself. Allison cared about this at all and listened to us after a decade of only caring about herself. Klaus has helped me so much this whole way. Hell, he flew to Russia and back in the span of 48 hours to get you! And Ben, Ben did what he feared most in the whole world, which was putting himself back in it. Does this sound like the actions of people who don’t believe, at least a little, that they’re responsible for saving the world?”

“Goddamn do we give great speeches,” Klaus whispered to himself, wiping away a tear.

“Fine, it does,” Vanya conceded. “But I’ll tell you this. Even if you convince me to not end the world, the Handler isn’t just gonna stop. She’s gonna bring the might of the whole Commission down on you, and I can confidently say that you and I alone know what that means.”

“Which is why, if you join us, we’re going to trick her,” Five said, tentatively hopeful.

“You wouldn’t trust me anyway. You would all think I’m going to betray you at any second.”

~~~

Ever since their twelfth birthday, training had gotten more intense, and Five and Vanya’s relationship began to crack. By dinner every night he was running on fumes, just like the rest of them, and he often didn’t have the energy to listen to Vanya play violin or read Sherlock Holmes stories together in secret. Reginald actually bothered making Vanya busy too, giving her extra homework and assignments in place of the physical training the others went through. She was just as burnt out, and was also spending her evenings researching World War II u-boats or Czar Peter the Great.

It was the one close relationship she had with anyone, and it was fading.

Five found her crying in the corner of her practice room one Saturday, which was a forgotten space of some kind smaller than her bedroom, but it had a piano in it Five sometimes accompanied Vanya on. She was curled up in the corner crying into her skirt.

“Vanya?” Five asked. She didn’t immediately respond, and Five went and sat next to her.

“What do you want?” she asked.

“I came to play piano with you,” he said. “It’s free time.”

“Why would you do that?”

“Because I like playing piano with you?” Five asked incredulously.

“Why don’t you go hang out with Ben or Diego instead? Every day you drift further from me and closer to them. I’m the dud of the family. Nobody wants or needs me.”

“Vanya, I--” Five wasn’t sure how to comfort her, exactly. He was only a boy of 12 and comforting people would never be his strong suit. “We’re still best friends,” is what he settled on, before having a bit more inspiration. “And there’s nothing dad or anyone else can do to stop that.”

“You mean it?”

Five nodded, and Vanya hugged him. Five stiffened up at first, and then relaxed and hugged his sister back.

~~~

“Vanya--” Five said. “We… we’re…” he swallowed his pride. “We’re gonna be best friends forever.”

He heard someone choke back laughter behind him, then someone punch someone else, and then Diego going “ow, Luther, what was that for?” and then Klaus going, “that was kind of a dick move, Diego.”

“That seemed kind of juvenile for you,” Vanya said, uncertain about everything.

“Well, look at me,” Five gestured at himself. “I think I deserve a chance to be a little juvenile.”

“So are you… defecting?” Allison asked.

Vanya looked as though she was still considering her options, but the rest all thought, at some level, that she must’ve been won over, or else she would’ve energy-blasted someone by now. She looked Five dead in the eyes.

“Promise me you’ll prevent me from causing the apocalypse. Promise me that you are 100% certain that the world will still be around on April 2nd if I team up with you.”

Without a moment’s hesitation Five responded. “I promise.”

There was a moment of silence, and Vanya nodded.

“Well, what’s the plan?”

“The plan was to trap you on the moon so you couldn’t destroy it without killing yourself, in the hopes this wasn’t a kamikaze mission,” Diego said flatly.

Vanya nodded and thought about that. “In the hotel I presume.”

“Yeah.”

“So what’s the plan now? The Commission is gonna find out I’ve defected.”

“Not if you don’t act like it,” Five said with the tone of someone who’s about to explain a plan. “Destroy this room a little bit and escape to the motel behind Griddy’s and get a room there. Camp out until the first, when we’ll come and ‘fight’ and take you to the moon, out of reach of the Commission.”

“Why not now?”

“What happens if they try to contact you again and can’t pinpoint your location? I know that on longer missions like this the Commission does check-ins via pneumatic tube.”

“Good point.”

“Speaking of longer missions…” Klaus interjected, “how are you part of the Russian National Orchestra and the Commission? Five kind of made it sound like he lived at Commission headquarters when not on a mission.”

“I was never a regular agent,” Vanya shrugged.

“Oh! Is it backstory time?” Luther asked.

“Guys, none of this is relevant,” Five said.

“C’mon, aren’t you even a little bit interested?” Allison asked him.

“No. I know what the Commission is like,” Five replied, crossing his arms.

“Well the rest of us are curious, mr-know-it-all,” Klaus said with finality.

Vanya sighed, slightly annoyed. “Fine, I guess I’ll give you the short version.”

~~~

Something about the violin drew Vanya towards it. She picked up the small wooden contraption, and the bow lying next to it. Her body instinctively knew how to place it on her shoulder, and she drew the bow across the strings and strummed a pleasant chord. She played a few notes, then, via muscle memory, she played a tune she later learned was Pachelbel’s Canon in D. It almost felt like she wasn’t playing the music, but someone else was, and she felt her chest glow and noticed waves of energy emit from the instrument. Someone opened the door to the room, some stranger in a nice suit. Vanya abruptly stopped.

“No, don’t stop,” the stranger said. He had a kind smile, a really kind smile, and seemed to be in a bit of a lull caused by the music.

“Uh…”

“Please, continue.”

“I don’t think I can,” Vanya said. She was nearly sure she’d have to start over. The man frowned.

“I’m sorry for interrupting you then,” he said, and he closed the door and left. She couldn’t help but feel that that was a weird interaction.

Days passed, and Vanya learned more about her powers. She learned how the violin could be used as a wand/amplifier, how to control her powers, and how to fight, with or without them. After two years of intense training, the Handler sent her back to Moscow with her mission. Live a normal, quiet life until given further instructions. She knew the eventual plan to cause the apocalypse in 10 years, but not much of the lead up. The Handler remained in contact and as the fateful day drew closer Vanya learned the entire plan, about how to deal with Klaus contacting her, how to act, and what to do if she’s discovered as an enemy. Everything was planned, everything except Five winning her back.

~~~

“Is that it?” Diego asked, unimpressed.

“Yeah, pretty much,” Vanya said. “The Commission got me an apartment, a bank account with some money, and all the documents I’d need to live a normal life.”

“Well I don’t think that was boring,” Allison said.

“Yeah, yeah,” Five said, redirecting attention back to himself. “Everyone evacuate the main room now except Vanya. You beat it up a little bit. Our bruises from the Griddy’s incident will have to cover for that and this fake fight. Vanya, once you’re done, run out the door.”

“What about the rest of us?” Ben asked.

“Don’t follow. We’re gonna pretend she knocked us unconscious. Now, everyone out!” Five roughly escorted his siblings out of the main hall, and they heard Vanya throwing furniture around.

“We should really go clean ourselves up now,” Allison said, touching the drying blood on her face.

“Yeah, you all look terrible,” Diego said with a smirk. Luther gently touched a bloodied spot on Diego’s shirt, and he cried out in pain. “Yeah, yeesh, fine, I’m coming with.”

Everyone went to do some first aid on themselves (even Five when Allison and Ben forced him), so Klaus was left alone in the entryway. A minute later, Vanya came out of the hall, a little sweaty and hair a little frazzled.

“Hey, can I ask you something?” Klaus said, stopping Vanya momentarily.

“What?”

“It’s just… you seemed to kind of change your mind really quick. How? After years of believing one thing so strongly, it seems kind of crazy you would just abandon it like that,” Klaus said with a snap of his fingers.

Vanya brushed her hair out of her face awkwardly. “Honestly…? I kinda started to question it all when I met you in Russia. You were nice and a little weird and you really sounded like you meant it when you said you needed me. But, I guess it really began when you asked me if I felt like I needed to prove myself because I always felt… ordinary.”

“That was the word Allison used to rumor you when we were kids,” Klaus said, feeling like Vanya deserved to know the truth. “She said something like ‘I heard a rumor you thought you were ordinary’ and I thought that there was a chance that rumor still had an effect on you and might trigger something.”

“Well… I think it did.”

“You should probably go now, before Five comes back and sees you’re still here,” Klaus said with a laugh.

“Yeah, I should,” she replied with a smile, before turning and sprinting out the door.

Chapter Text

Diego applied neosporin to a cut on his forehead. “So… do you trust her?” he asked.

Five didn’t answer immediately. He was sitting on a table and Luther was applying rubbing alcohol to a nasty wound on his arm.

“Uh, Five?” Allison said. “Diego asked you a question.”

“Oh, what? Yes, I do trust her,” Five replied nonchalantly.

“Why? How? You and I heard the same life story, right? And don’t give me any of that ‘oh we were best friends as kids’ bullshit or anything. If anything, I agree with her on the whole… it being weird to hear you say that… thing.”

Five shrugged. “We were best friends. And I trust her because she’s trusting me.”

“To stop her from causing the apocalypse?” Ben asked.

“Yes.”

“So we’re not gonna like… make any plans in case she’s lying to us?” Diego asked. “No fail safes?”

“Go ahead and do that if it’ll make you more comfortable,” Five said as he took the roll of bandages from Luther and began wrapping his arm. “But we won’t need it.” He finished wrapping it, taped down the bandages, hopped off the table, and exited the room.

“He knows that he didn’t bandage everything, right?” Luther asked.

“I don’t think the little maniac cares,” Diego replied. “Anyone else think he’s crazy for blindly trusting Vanya like that?”

“A little,” Allison admitted.

“Yeah.”

“Kinda.”

“So… what are we gonna do if she’s fucking with us and is still on the Commission’s side?”

Everyone glanced at each other but no one had any answers.

“We shouldn’t have this conversation without Klaus,” Ben piped up.

Diego bit his lip. “Fine. Go get him then.”

~~~

Ben found Klaus tossing one of Reginald’s many awards to himself in the main room, which had been turned into a wreck by Vanya.

“Oh hey,” Klaus said. “All patched up then?”

“Yeah.”

“Wanna explore this place since we’re stuck here pretending to be unconscious? Five showed me a bit of the mansion but I haven’t really had time to properly explore it.”

“I would, but actually we all kind of need you right now. We’re having an important discussion.”

Klaus’s face became more serious and he put the award back down on its shelf. “Oh, okay.”

~~~

“Where’s Five?” Klaus asked as soon as he entered the room where his siblings were waiting for him.

“He didn’t want to be part of this discussion,” Diego answered. “Did Ben tell you what this is about?”

“No.”

“We need a plan in case Vanya is lying to us.”

Klaus’s eyes narrowed slightly. “I don’t think she is.”

“Of course, none of us want to believe that,” Allison interjected. “But people don’t usually turn their worldviews around that fast. We just want a failsafe, just in case.”

“You can’t be too careful,” Luther added.

“The thing is, she didn’t,” Klaus said. “I just had a discussion with her, right before she left. She’s actually been thinking about this stuff for a while, since I contacted her.”

“Klaus, that was a few days ago. Hardly ‘a while,’” Allison said, crossing her arms.

“I know, but your opinions on things sure turned around in the past few days too,” he retorted, his tone growing a bit more harsh. Allison shut up.

“She’s a master manipulator, Klaus,” Diego said. “You think the Handler person didn’t teach her to be an expert liar?”

“Well I’m a trained therapist. I’m an expert at seeing through that, and I think she is being sincere.”

“Trust me, I would love for that to be true, it would make our lives a helluva lot easier, but you don’t have super-truth detection powers, you’re a seance. All I’m saying is, we can’t risk it.”

Klaus sighed. “Fine. Since the end of the world is on the line, I guess we should be prepared for any outcome.” He meant what he said, but he also thought that it was better to be in on any plans than out. “What have you got?”

“Uh, well, we were just about to start working out the details,” Diego said sheepishly.

Klaus sat down in a chair. “Alrighty then.”

“Well I was thinking I just knock her out again,” Allison said. “She woke up naturally after about half an hour last time when I didn’t specify how long to sleep, so I can always just say ‘I heard a rumor you fell asleep for 24 hours’ or something to keep her unconscious longer.”

“She’d be prepared for that now,” Diego said. “That’s the problem, we lost the element of surprise when it comes to our combat capacity thanks to the fight at Griddy’s.”

Klaus looked at Ben. “We could always keep training. You think two at a time is possible in the next 48 hours?”

Ben looked down. “I don’t know… The more I open the portal the less control I have. I don’t wanna hurt anyone,” his voice got quieter as he finished his thought.

“Let’s stop thinking about all the surprises we lost and start thinking about what we still have,” Luther offered. “I mean, it was a short fight, you all can’t have used all your moves.”

“If I throw a knife at her or shoot her she uses her powers to send them flying away.”

“Did you try keeping control over those things?” Klaus asked.

Diego’s jaw half dropped. “I-- the-- objects don’t usually resist…”

“Guys?” Ben asked. “Aren’t we over-complicating things?”

“What do you mean?” Luther asked.

“Well… Allison’s rumor was so effective, a man starved himself to death because the power one of her rumors had over him was so strong that it trumped his biological need to feed himself. She can just rumor her. All she has to say is ‘I heard a rumor you never intentionally hurt another person again’ and Vanya literally will be physically incapable of destroying the Earth, whether she wants to or not.”

The boys looked at Allison and she was staring off into space with a look tinged by fear and regret.

“That would solve all our problems…” Diego muttered.

“No, I won’t.”

“What do you mean you won’t?”

“I won’t supersede someone’s free will like that again. After the Walter Abel incident I carefully worked to reduce the unintended consequences of my rumors as much as possible, and things still sometimes went wrong. What happens if I rumor Vanya in the way you just described and she gets attacked in a dark alleyway in the middle of the night. She can’t defend herself anymore, and she’s mugged, or hurt, or worse.”

Ben’s cheeks reddened. “Okay, so maybe not that rumor, but another one, a more careful one.”

“No. That still has the whole ‘superseding free will’ problem.”

“Allison, you’re a Fortune 500 CEO. You’re telling me you never superseded anyone’s free will on your way to the top?” Klaus asked dryly.

“Well… maybe I don’t want to anymore. Maybe I want to improve as a person, you know, the whole concept your job is based on?”

“Really annoying time to grow a moral compass, Allison,” Diego said.

“Sorry it wasn’t more convenient for you.”

“...And the rest of the human race.”

“Guys, stop bickering,” Ben said. “We’re trying to problem solve remember?”

“Oh shit,” Klaus said. “It wasn’t just Allison’s rumor that suppressed Vanya’s powers, she had to take pills.”

There was a pause as people exchanged glances.

“Do you think any of those pills still exist?” Diego asked.

“I have no idea. On the one hand, Hargreeves seems like the kind of person who would carefully destroy all evidence of once having children, on the other hand, I can imagine him keeping some just in case. The question is, was he more paranoid about being caught having erased the entire world’s memory, or about Vanya seeking revenge?”

Based on the way Five talked about Reginald’s opinions on Vanya, they all knew what the correct answer was.

“If only we could get into that secret room!” Diego said, annoyed. “Me and Five found this whole secret office behind Vanya’s prison but without his blinking powers there’s no way to get in.”

“Why don’t we ask Grace?” Klaus said. “She has all her memories back and she’d do anything to spite Hargreeves.”

“Oh yeah.”

The five siblings searched the mansion up and down for Grace, and couldn’t find her anywhere. That was, until. Allison opened a window over an outdoor staircase and smelled smoke. She looked down and saw Grace standing over a pile of beautiful oil paintings, getting destroyed by fire. In one hand was a bottle of petroleum, in the other, a lighter.

“Oh shit,” she said. She went out the window and climbed down to the ground.

“Grace,” she said, feeling a little awkward about calling the robot by her first name, for some reason.

“Yes Allison?” Grace replied cheerfully, turning around. There were black smudges on her face, and her hair wasn’t as perfect as it was before.

“Um, are you okay?”

Grace rolled her eyes. “Yes, darling. I am simply ending Reginald’s reign of terror over this household.”

Allison didn’t have a good response for that. “Um, so we were wondering if Reginald had any of Vanya’s pills still lying around. I could take them off your hands… unless you burned them already.”

Grace thought this over. “Hmm… I believe he kept some in a safe in his office. It was behind his self portrait, but I took that,” she pointed at the pile of paintings, “so it should be easy to find. The code is 19-10-35.”

“Ok, thanks,” Allison said, she started to turn to leave, but she couldn’t quite pick her feet off the ground. Before, when Diego was mocking her, she doubted herself. Did she really sprout a moral compass overnight? But here, now, unable to leave in the pursuit of her own self interest without making sure the woman who raised her was ok, she believed she had, maybe just a little bit. “Um, do you have any way of putting that fire out?”

Grace pointed at a fire extinguisher sitting several feet away from the fire. “Once it’s all melted down I’ll put the fire out. And don’t worry, I tested it, and it still works.”

“Ok, good,” Allison nodded. She slowly turned and left, and climbed back up into the house, her stomach still hurting a little. Once back through the window, she sprinted to Reginald’s office, and saw the safe behind his desk.

19-10-35.

The safe cracked open, and all sorts of things were in there. Old medals that were so worn they barely read 1926, boring as hell documents, the deed to the mansion, what looked like a jewelry box, and an orange bottle filled with little white pills. Allison took the bottle, it was entirely unlabeled, and she wondered if this kind of medication “went bad.” Allison wasn’t entirely sure how serious dates on medication were anyways. She’d had ibuprofens before that had passed their expiration date, but prescription medicines’ dates might be more serious. Then again, this was a magic-power suppressing pill. Maybe it never went bad. Or maybe it might make Vanya horribly ill. Or kill her.

Was this plan any more ethical than rumouring her? Allison still thought it was, but that didn’t necessarily make it ethical. With this newfound commitment to morality… could she give her sister a pill without knowing what that pill would do?

She looked at the little bottle, deep in thought about what the right thing to do was. Destroy them? Hand them to Diego? (Almost certainly not that one.) Hold onto them?

She suddenly heard footsteps running up to the office. “Allison!” Klaus cried in a huff, “We found Grace. She was outside burning paintings! The others have gone to put it out… What are you holding?”

“I found Grace earlier. She told me Reginald kept leftover pills in this safe.”

“Oh… why didn’t you say something?”

“I mean, she had a fire extinguisher. And if I ran into one of you I would’ve said something but I didn’t. I was going to tell you now that I’ve found them.”

“It kind of looked like you were staring at that bottle.”

“They’re decade-old power suppressants. I mean… how could I not think about them?”

Klaus took a moment before responding. “I would’ve killed for those at one point.”

An awkward tension bloomed in the room.

“Things would be easier, wouldn’t they?” Allison said.

“Like you ever had to fight for anything,” Klaus rolled his eyes.

“I did! I had to fight my way up from nothing just like the rest of you! I’m not gonna say I had it as hard but… we all had our different struggles, okay?”

His face softened. “You’re right. We all do. Speaking of, let’s go make sure Grace is okay.”

Allison nodded, and pocketed the pills.

The pair walked expeditiously across the mansion, the subject of the pills still weighing heavily on their minds.

“I’m not sure I want to give them to Diego,” Allison offered. “I’m afraid he’s going to sneak into Vanya’s hotel in the middle of the night and force-feed her.”

Klaus laughed. “I don’t think he’d do that… but I get where you’re coming from. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what he thinks about them.”

They got outside and the fire was out, covered in white foamy stuff, and the others were talking to Grace. It was unclear whether they were comforting her or asking her what the hell she was doing.

“Guys,” Allison said. “I’ve got the pills.” She held them out.

“Awesome,” Diego said, stepping forward. Allison stepped back.

“Hold on. We don’t know what these will do.”

“Yes we do. They’ll suppress her powers, and her emotions a bit.”

“These are 12 years old. How do we know they still work as they’re supposed to?” Everyone turned to Grace.

“I don’t know if they’ve gone bad. He created the formula on his own and sent it off to be made at his contacts at a compounding pharmacy.”

“What’s a compounding pharmacy?” Diego asked.

“It’s a special pharmacy that makes its own drugs,” Klaus answered. “Usually it’s for people who need special amounts of a drug, or are allergic to one ingredient in a drug and need their own version, or something like that.”

“So I guess we need to contact that compounding pharmacy,” Allison said.

Diego groaned. “This is ridiculous. I’m not calling some fucking pharmacy about a magic pill to make sure it still works after 12 years. It’s a magic pill, I’m sure it still works.”

“Plus, it’s a last resort,” Luther said. “We probably won’t have to use it at all.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” Allison replied. Diego reached out to take the pills again. “I’m holding onto them though.” She shoved the bottle into her pocket with finality.

~~~

After the non-conversation about back-up plans in case Vanya was lying (and she wasn’t, Five didn’t have a doubt in his mind), Five spent some time looking through the documents on Hotel Oblivion, and the notes his siblings made, which had been moved to the library. They had started trying to decipher the codes and symbols, and had even made a little progress (Five was proud, but also a bit surprised). He took their notes and started organizing them in his own way, and adding to them. He kept turning, instinctually, looking for Dolores. She had sat and watched him work out math problems for years in the apocalypse, and her not being here made him feel a bit lonely. Something about working on hard problems without her around to bounce ideas off of felt… wrong.

Then Klaus walked in.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hello,” Five returned, not looking up.

“Working on deciphering those documents, huh?”

“Yes, and I’d prefer some peace and quiet to do so.”

“Oh, okay…”

Klaus sheepishly turned to leave, before Five realized his brother might be useful after all. He wasn’t Dolores by any stretch, but maybe ideas could bounce off of him as well.

“Come here actually, I have a question about something.”

“Oh, okay,” Klaus said, with an entirely different tone. He bounced over and looked at the diagram Five had in front of him on the desk.

“I can’t tell if these are laser bars or if they’re metal bars that can be retracted,” Five said, pointing at a blueprint of a jail cell with cylindrical devices at the top and bottom of bars, which were drawn in with dotted lines.

“Hm,” Klaus said, looking over the entire diagram. “Too bad he didn’t draw the bars in red or something,” he said with a laugh. He then looked a bit closer. “What does this symbol mean, next to the bars?”

Five looked at the symbol then at his notes. “I think that’s the number… um… 2500. And the symbol next to it…” he flipped through more notes and pages. “I know I saw it somewhere before…” he kept flipping through, until Klaus stopped him.

“Wait! That’s a lightbulb right? With the symbol again!”

Five looked between the diagram of the futuristic light bulb and the jail cell. His face reddened.

“It’s… voltage. 2500 volts,” he said like he couldn’t believe he didn’t figure it out himself.

“So it’s laser bars?”

“Something like that…”

Klaus patted him on the back. “Hell yeah! We figured it out!”

“Alright, well, um, thanks,” Five said, flustered.

“There’s no reason for you to be embarrassed. Humans only lived this long because we helped each other. I mean, hell, I wouldn’t be here right now to help you out on this laser jail thing if you hadn’t gone out of your way to get my help, and everyone else’s.”

Five didn’t respond, instead choosing to mark down the symbol for voltage in his notes.

“Alright well… I just came in to let you know we uh, found some of Vanya’s old power-suppressants and Allison’s holding onto them.”

Five’s grip on his pen tightened. “And what exactly are you planning to do with them?” he asked through gritted teeth.

“Nothing, unless Vanya betrays us again.”

“I told you all, she won’t.”

“I’m with you on that, but it makes the others feel more comfortable.”

Five sighed irritatingly. “Fine. Whatever. Let them be comforted. Just make sure they don’t do anything stupid.”

“Got it. Alright I’ll leave you to it now,” Klaus said, before slipping out.

“I can’t believe I put Klaus in charge of making sure the others don’t do anything stupid,” Five mumbled to himself.

~~~

Around midnight, after the others had found someplace in the mansion to sleep (they all avoided their childhood bedrooms, which Five found weirdly understandable), Five slipped out to the motel he told Vanya to get a room at. He blinked around the hallways, looking for a sign of which room was Vanya’s. He then saw a bit of paper sticking out of the door in room 212. Five pulled it out. All it had on it was a big V in pen, but with lines at the bottom and top of the V, like whoever wrote it was trying to be fancy. Five then nearly facepalmed. It wasn’t a V, it was the roman numeral five.

Five was about to knock, but he heard talking from behind the door. He gently put his ear up to the door and listened, and quickly recognized the sickening lilt of the Handler.

“…disappointed with the mess you made at Griddy’s which we had to clean up, but I suppose one can’t be perfect.”

“No ma’am.”

“Try to lay low until time,” the Handler said. “I’d really rather not have to clean up any more unplanned messes.”

“Yes ma’am.”

There was a pause, a blue flash from under the door, and then silence. Five heard Vanya shuffling around and doing whatever one does in a hotel, and knocked on the door.

Vanya opened it. “Hi.”

“Hello. May I come in?”

“Uh, yes?”

Five walked inside and Vanya shut the door behind him. He sat down on the desk chair that came with the room, and Vanya sat across from him on the bed.

“So uh…” Vanya said awkwardly.

“I only heard the last part,” Five answered preemptively. “About cleaning up the mess at Griddy’s.”

“Okay,” Vanya said, a little relieved.”

“So. Why the hell did she show up in person?”

“I think it was mostly for the Griddy’s thing, and maybe just to scare me a little now that it’s so close. And also--”

“What else did she talk about? What did she know?”

“Well she’s aware of your plans to take me to the hotel. She instructed me to incapacitate Allison first, then Ben and you, then everyone else. She also warned me about not being ‘seduced to their side.’”

“Have you thought about what you’re actually going to do?”

“Well, we’re going to have to fight, and I’m going to have to let you win somehow without looking like I did.”

Five nodded. “How could we incapacitate you?”

Vanya eyed him suspiciously. “Why? I’m going to lose on purpose.”

“I mean, what’s your weakness? What prevents you from using your powers, naturally? For example, if Allison’s vocal cords are destroyed, she couldn’t use her powers.”

“Oh, um… lack of sleep?”

“Would restraining your hands do it?”

Vanya shook her head. “The Handler trained me to be able to use them while completely immobilized. There’s no way to stop me without fatally injuring me or putting me to sleep again. And if I let Allison rumor me again… it might be too obvious.”

“What if Luther pretends to hit the back of your head?”

Vanya tensed. “Are you sure he can do that convincingly without concussing me?”

Five nodded. “I’ll make sure of it. So, where and when are you ending the world?”

“8:30pm. With my violin. I’m supposed to play in the park and use it as an amplifier to blow up the moon.”

“Your violin?”

“She brought it to me. I was about to tell you but you interrupted me.”

“Oh. Sorry.” Five said stiffly. “So we’ll go to the park and bring you to the moon.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

Five readied his fists to blink, but Vanya interrupted.

“Wait!” she cried. “I just-- one last thing. The Handler… she told me there was no way to reverse my retrograde amnesia. I was wondering if maybe there was some way to get those memories back. If the Commission can’t, maybe Hargreeves could.”

Five shook his head. “I don’t think there’s any way to undo what Hargreeves did. I have my suspicions he involved Allison’s rumor on all of you in some way to make sure that the amnesia was absolutely permanent. Either way, I just don’t think it’s possible. I’m sorry.”

Vanya looked down. “Well… I thought it was worth asking.”

“Maybe that’s something we can look into, after we save the world.”

She smiled up at him. “Yeah, we could.”

Five smiled, just a little bit, back at her. “It’s nice to be on the same side again.” And then he blinked away.

Chapter Text

Five blinked into the corner of the library where Klaus was sleeping.

“Morning!” he yelled. “Family meeting. Kitchen. 10 minutes. Luther’s cooking breakfast.”

Klaus moaned something indecipherable, then, “what time is it?”

“8.”

“8am?? Couldn’t it wait a little bit?” he moaned.

“Klaus, the world ends in 36 and a half hours. No.”

“Oh ok,” Klaus said, sitting up slightly. Five blinked away.

Klaus shuffled to the kitchen to see Luther cooking stacks of pancakes and bacon. Allison was there too, drinking coffee, looking more awake than Klaus but less awake than Luther.

“Morning, gang,” Klaus said, still a little groggy.

“Want some coffee?” Allison asked.

“No, I don’t drink coffee. I will have some pancakes though.” He grabbed a plate and some cutlery and served himself three pancakes and a few pieces of bacon, before sitting at the table and digging in. “Thanks for cooking breakfast, by the way.”

“It’s nothing,” Luther said jovially.

Diego arrived next, looking equally dead as Klaus.

“Did Five yell you all awake too?” he asked.

“Normally we say ‘good morning,’” Allison replied.

“The world ends tomorrow Allison, get your priorities in order,” he snapped back, before brightening when he saw a full pot of coffee, and making a beeline towards it.

“I’m kinda surprised Five’s up-and-at-em so early,” Klaus commented, trying to calm the mood of the room down. “I’ve never seen the little guy sleep.”

“I found him already drinking coffee this morning when I came down,” Luther said. “I think he lives on coffee and sheer grit alone.”

“That’s chillingly plausible.”

Ben came down next, a bit groggy. “Good morning,” he said.

“Morning,” Allison and Klaus replied.

Ben and Diego got their coffee and food, and sat down, and Allison sat down too. Five then blinked into the room and got himself a fresh cup, and sat down. Luther finished cooking, gave himself a large plate of pancakes and took his spot at the table.

“Alright, let’s get down to business,” Five said. “I met with Vanya last night.” Everyone’s faces reacted slightly, but Five didn’t give any of them time to open their mouth and interrupt him. “We’re going to have a fake fight with her at 8:30pm tomorrow in Midway Park. She has instructions to incapacitate Allison first, so you’ll have to feign injury. Luther, you’re going to pretend to knock Vanya out by fake hitting her on the back of the head with something. Then we’re going to take her to Hotel Oblivion.”

“What about the rest of us?” Diego asked.

“You’re taking me to the moon too, right?” Allison added.

“Diego, you, Klaus, and Ben will also be fake fighting her. Allison, Luther can pick you up, we’re not gonna leave you here.”

“I don’t know if the tentacles can fake-fight,” Ben said quietly.

“Figure it out! If you don’t release one again like you did at Griddy’s, the Commission is going to be extremely suspicious. That reminds me-- the Commission is dealing with Griddy’s. Don’t worry about it.”

“Oh cool, the evil people are solving that problem,” Diego said with an eye-roll.

“Actually, our interests are pretty aligned on that front: keeping a low profile,” Five corrected him.

“What are we supposed to do until then?” Luther asked.

“Train. Practice. Not leave the mansion so you don’t fuck everything up. Prepare yourself to go to the moon. Generally not fuck everything up.”

“Aye, aye captain,” Klaus said, with a sarcastic little salute. “That reminds me, can I call my boyfriend?”

“No!” Five cried. “No outside contact.”

“What?!” Allison and Diego both cried.

“Five, that’s really not fair. We could all be dead tomorrow. Some of us have people we care about,” Klaus said.

“Everyone I care about is in this room!” Five yelled, angry enough for it not to sound sweet. “We are not fucking this up at the 11th hour!” And with that he stormed out.

“Dang,” Ben said, breaking the silence.

“Yeah, no, I’m still calling my boyfriend.”

“Is there a phone in this place? I haven’t seen one,” Allison asked.

“Yeah, there’s one by our old bedrooms. I hope it still works.”

“Are you sure you should do that?” Luther asked. “Five sounded pretty serious.”

“Five always sounds serious,” Klaus retorted. “And he literally just admitted he doesn’t have anyone he cares about on the outside. ‘Cept Vanya, I guess. He doesn’t have anyone to call.”

Luther bit his tongue.

“I don’t have anyone to call but I want to see our rooms,” Ben said.

Klaus led Diego, Allison, and Ben up to their old rooms. Klaus managed to remember whose was whose, and pointed them out to each of them, before making a beeline to the phone to use it first. He picked it up, and there was a dial tone coming through. “Yes!” he cried to himself, before dialing the apartment’s number. It was Sunday, so there was a chance Aaron was home. After the phone rang a few times, Aaron picked up.

“Hello?”

“Aaron. It’s me.”

“Klaus? Oh thank God! Where the ever-loving fuck have you been?! We’re gonna have one hell of a conversation when--”

“Aaron. I can’t talk for long. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry I haven’t called in a few days. Things have been crazy.”

“Yeah I kinda noticed.”

“Basically I just wanted to tell you that we’ve got the apocalypse figured out. We’re gonna stop it.”

“When is it?”

Klaus ignored Aaron’s question. “If I’m home in two days, then it’s all over.”

“Two days?? Klaus, the world is supposed to end in less than two days?!”

“I promise as soon as it’s safe I’ll come home.”

“Wait, hold on. What about Hotel Oblivion? Are those monsters there?”

Klaus actually paused, and sighed. The monster he saw in the alley that one time… were more of them waiting for him on the moon? “I don’t know. But…” he looked at his siblings. Diego was standing in his old doorway waiting for Klaus to finish. Allison was inside her room looking around and digging through the drawers. Ben stood in the middle of his room meekly. “…I’m not alone.”

“If I asked you to come home now, would you?”

“No. I can’t leave my family alone either.”

Aaron sighed on the other end.

“I gotta go,” Klaus said.

“I know you do.”

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

Klaus hung up, and Diego came to make his call.

Diego called Eudora.

“Hello?”

“Hi. It’s Diego.”

“Diego? How are you? Where are you? I called your apartment and you didn’t answer. After… I’m a little worried about you.”

“I’m okay. Look. You know the bomb shelter under the station?”

“Yeah?”

“Tomorrow night, at around 8 o’clock, I want you to go down there and lock it up, and don’t come out until the next morning.”

“Diego… you still think the world is ending?”

“I’m 90% sure we can stop it, but there’s too many variables, and I’m working with someone I don’t trust. Please, for my sake, just do it.”

There was silence on the other end.

“Dora?”

“Still here.”

“I uh… I also wanna, um, apologize for my… behavior last time we met,” Diego looked over at Klaus picking at his nails a few feet away. He didn’t want any of them to hear the word “confession.”

“Oh.”

“I was rude, and I was asking too much of you.”

“Well now I’m really concerned,” she said with the sarcasm Diego loved so much.

“I’m fine. I’ll be fine if you promise me you’ll go to the shelter.”

“What am I supposed to say if someone sees me going down there? What happens if someone tries to come in?”

“Make up an excuse, and don’t let ‘em in! It’s that simple.”

Eudora exhaled sharply in frustration. “Diego. This is crazy. I’m not doing it.”

“I’ll give you 20 bucks,” Diego said without thinking. ANYTHING to get her to save her life.

“20 bu-- Diego, what is this?”

Diego groaned and inwardly face-palmed. “I-- you know-- just…”

“Diego, get some sleep. Please. Relax. Read a book or watch some shitty TV.”

Diego’s lower lip trembled, and he was glad he was facing away from his siblings so no one could see.

“Eu-eu-eudora,” Diego struggled, “P-please.”

“I’ll see you at work in a few weeks, Diego. Maybe I could bring over some dinner?”

“N-not tonight.”

“Ok, not tonight. Sometime. I’ll call you.”

“Alright.”

“Bye.”

“Bye…”

Diego hung up the phone and sighed.

“That didn’t sound like it went well,” Klaus said.

“Don’t spy on me.”

“I wasn’t. It was noble of you to try and save Eudora.”

“I’m surprised you didn’t tell Aaron to get underground. He believes you.”

“Five said everyone was dead. If a bomb shelter could prevent her death I’m sure Five would’ve met someone saved by a bomb shelter. Also, it doesn’t matter. We’re gonna beat the Commission and stop the end of the world.”

Diego shook his head slightly. “Well, we’ll try.”

Allison came out of her room. “Is the phone free? I’ve got to call my husband.”

“Go ahead,” Diego said, walking away. Klaus watched him walk away and felt a little sad, and a little worried. The closer they got to showtime the higher their emotions were going to run. And knowing his siblings… that wouldn’t be good. Klaus then went to get Ben and give Allison some privacy.

“I wonder what it looked like when I lived here,” Ben said to Klaus.

Klaus shrugged. “I’d say ask Five, but maybe wait until we’ve succeeded.”

“Yeah…”

“Let’s go back downstairs and give Allison some privacy.”

“Ok.”

They slipped past Allison and wandered back downstairs. The main room was still a mess, and Klaus looked at the bar, untouched after Vanya exploded it when he summoned Reginald. He itched for a drink, or something stronger. The world might end tomorrow, and a shamefully large part of him wanted to say “fuck it” to 8 years of sobriety and just let loose before they all died.

“Where’d Luther go?” Ben asked.

“I dunno.”

~~~

Luther looked around the empty room. Like the rest of them, the mansion made him feel a little uncomfortable, especially when he was alone. He felt a presence looming over him, like he was about to get directions at any minute to do something, but, of course, those directions never came.

Maybe he should’ve broken Five’s directions and gone with his siblings. He left the main room, but didn’t know where to go. He was drawn outside to the courtyard. The stillness of the outdoor scene felt unnerving and wrong. He went back inside and wandered around, looking at the paintings Grace had yet to take down, and the dusty awards in their cabinets. Then, he and Allison bumped into each other after her phone call.

“Oh, hi,” Luther said.

“Hi.”

“Phone call go okay?”

“Yeah. I’ve been lying to my husband and saying I was on an emergency business trip… he thinks I’m in Hong Kong on a house visit for a wealthy businessman.”

“Oh…”

Allison put her head in her hand. “Why did I just say that?”

Luther shrugged. “Maybe you wanted someone to know the truth.”

“I guess…”

There was an awkward pause.

“This must’ve been a rough two days for you,” Allison said. “At least I got some warning.”

“Yeah, I guess,” Luther said. “But you get used to crazy things in showbiz. And… we’re family. I feel it in my gut.” He patted his torso to emphasize his point.

There was an awkward pause.

“Uh… so how comfortable are you with fake-knocking-people-out? I mean, I could use a partner to practice fake-being-knocked-out. I did think about becoming an actor for a bit but then Ventus took off…” Allison trailed off, looking like she didn’t mean to say so much again.

“Ok. Let’s go find that training place Klaus and Ben used to practice.”

“Where did Five say it was?”

“Across the courtyard. I’ll show you.”

Luther and Allison went to the training arena, and saw the remains of the exploded mannequin Klaus and Ben didn’t clean up.

“Sheesh,” Allison said when she saw the mess. “Kinda rude of them to just leave that there, don't you think?”

“I guess,” Luther replied, before going to pick up the pieces. “But there was that family meeting right after and they didn’t have time to clean it up. Besides, it’s just some plastic and stuffing.”

Allison still thought it was rude, and she stood there for a moment, before going to help Luther pick up the garbage. Once thrown out, they investigated the closet. There were several other training dummies there, as well as other sports equipment and weights. Luther went to the biggest one he could find and lifted it up with barely a grunt.

“Hm,” Luther said. “It’s only about 300 pounds.”

“Only?”

“I once lifted 15 acrobats. I mean, acrobats tend to be on the slim side, but still.”

Luther moved the weight up and down a little bit, then tossed it from his right hand to his left, surprisingly gently. Allison was stunned. She had seen this man rip a bolted table out of the ground, but there was something shocking about seeing someone be so inhumanely strong in such a… boring context.

“No wonder you’re built the way you are…” Allison said. It slipped out of her mouth and she immediately regretted it, when Luther looked away.

“I’m not sure that my powers and my body are related.”

“How could they not be?”

Luther hesitated to answer her. “It’s… it… I just had a feeling that somehow I wasn’t always like this…” he put the weight down and started wrapping his arms around himself, as if giving himself a hug, almost unconsciously. “And then there was Five’s reaction to seeing me.”

“What do you mean?”

“Obviously I didn’t know the whole story at the time, but… he looked at me with this shock on his face I’ve never seen again. And then he asked me about my body and told me I was ‘lanky’ as a kid. So this… this isn’t natural.”

Luther couldn’t quite tell what emotion that brought out in Allison. After years spent hiding her own emotions in order to be strong in a capitalist male world, Allison had perfected the art of a straight face that didn’t come off as “resting bitch.” Finally, she let out a small sigh.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“Don’t be. It’s not your fault.”

“How do we know that? It’s my fault that Vanya is the way she is, and we still don’t know how linked my rumors are to what happened to us. Maybe it’s my fault that you went from lanky to ape-y.”

“You know… I’ve spent two days researching the hell out of the apocalypse and spent none of that time trying to figure out what happened to me,” Luther said. “Five mentioned he found out about Vanya’s powers from Reginald’s journal in his office. Let’s go find it.”

“Mm, okay.”

The two went to Reginald’s office and rummaged around and found the first journal that ended on May 31st, 2006, before their amnesia. Allison then found a second journal below a false bottom in the bottom desk drawer. That journal started on June 3rd, 2006.

“I found it,” Allison said. “This one should include the amnesia incident.”

Luther crowded up next to her as she flipped through the pages, only stopping briefly to read a passage from October 1st, 2006.

“I do dread to think what shall happen to the Academy in one years time,” Reginald wrote. “I have no doubt most of them will abandon me. I shall have to make this last year of control count.”

Allison and Luther both shivered.

But Reginald didn’t get another year, only a few months. The journal suddenly stopped only a quarter of the way through.

~~~

February 23, 2007

This shall be my last entry, for I have taken drastic measures that have changed everything.

One week ago I sent the Academy on what should’ve been a standard mission to the Himalayas. However, 00.01 decided to sacrifice himself for 00.06 by getting in the way of a flamethrower that surely would’ve killed 00.06. 00.01 came back with severe burns, and had to be treated with the last resort, permanently damaging and altering his body. Just like with 00.05, public perception of that decision got out of hand, and I decided to erase it all. 00.03 came in handy for one final time and ensured that she could not undo what I did.

00.07 has been sent back to country of origin for safety.

They and their agents have yet to be seen. Perhaps they have given up on controlling me.

Tomorrow begins the arduous journey of cleaning up every remaining scrap of evidence on Earth save for a few things in my own home. After the clean up is done G. will receive a full wipe to ensure compliance and loyalty.

Although this has been a thoroughly shameful ending for something that started as a successful experiment, the past 17 years have provided me with much knowledge about Marigold and human psychology.

Perhaps this isn’t the end. 00.05 could return, or something could fall through the crack, but until then, I officially declare the Umbrella Academy Experiment over.

-R.H.

~~~

When they both finished reading, there was a stunned moment of silence. Then, Luther spoke up, quietly.

“So I guess you were three, Vanya was seven, and Klaus was four…”

“That’s what you took away from that?” Allison asked incredulously.

“Well, I--”

“Sorry,” Allison interrupted, realizing her error. “I didn’t mean that, I just…” she trailed off.

“Well, we got our answer. Hargreeves made me like this. After I risked my life for Ben.”

“And he used my rumor as a failsafe to make sure we could never get our memories back…”

“But what’s ‘Marigold?’ And who are ‘they and their agents?’”

“I’d guess ‘they’ is the Commission, but I have no clue what Marigold is. Anyways, we have to show this to the others. Five might know what Marigold is. Or who Marigold is.”

~~~

Five had gone back to his old bedroom to calm down. He’d forgotten, after 45 years, how goddamn stupid his siblings could be. He punched the bed a few times and then sat down on his and collected his thoughts. One more day. He’d save the world tomorrow, and then the hell he’d been living in for 45 years would be gone. Then he’d help his siblings get their memories back, figure out the connection between Reginald and the Commission, and solve all the other mysteries he just didn’t have time to get to in the past 7 days.

He realized there was a chance (a big chance) that his siblings had ignored him and called their loved ones. He just hoped the Commission wouldn’t notice. He rubbed his eyes. He needed a goddamn drink.

He fell back on the bed. If only Vanya didn’t destroy the bar… he couldn’t very well purchase alcohol in this twip of a body and he couldn’t ask anyone else to do it for him.

That’s when he heard Luther yelling for a family meeting.

~~~

Allison read the journal entry out loud, then closed the leather-bound book.

“Well, that explains some things,” Klaus said to break the tension.

“Um… thanks,” Ben said awkwardly, looking at Luther. “For uh, saving my life and all.”

“Uh, you’re welcome,” Luther said, equally awkwardly. “It’s no big deal.”

Five was rummaging around on one end of the bar.

“You okay, buddy?” Diego said.

“Yeah, I thought you’d be interested in something like this,” Klaus added.

“Aha,” Five said, picking up a completely unharmed bottle of whiskey. “I knew some of you must’ve survived Vanya.”

“What are you doing?” Allison asked.

Five opened the bottle. “I’m taking the edge off, sister.” He got an unbroken glass, poured some of the whiskey in, and took the shot, and then shook it off. “Oh yeah. If I had to give the old man credit for anything it’s that he knew quality booze.” Five poured another shot and noticed everyone looking at him strangely.

“I’m not opposed to sharing,” he said. “If you can find a glass that isn’t broken.”

“Did you hear any of what I just said?” Allison asked, a little on the angry side.

“Yeah. Luther was being his usual self-sacrificing Number One self, dad didn’t like the bad press he got for monkeyfying him and saving his life, and then he erased everyone’s memories. Again. He also saw us as nothing more than an experiment. We knew most of this already.”

“What about Marigold? What the hell is that?”

Five shrugged, and took a slower sip of his whiskey. “I don’t know. I’ve never heard of it. And whatever it is, it doesn’t change the plan.”

“Is nobody going to mention that it’s 9 in the morning?” Diego said.

“What else is there to do?” Five asked nihilistically.

“Um, learn more about Hotel Oblivion?” Allison interjected. “Or how exactly my rumors played into our amnesia?”

Five took the rest of the shot. “Fine. You all want to go to Oblivion? Let’s take a field trip.”

“Five?” Klaus asked, sort of shakily.

“Yeah?”

“Did you see anything-- anyone when you went there?”

“No.”

“I don’t wanna go there until I have to,” Ben interrupted. “Klaus, would you stay here with me?”

“Oh, yeah, sure, totally.”

“Anyone else staying home?” Five asked, looking at his other siblings. None of them spoke up. “Great. Let’s go.”

He got up and walked to one of the couches and pulled the briefcase out from under it. He picked it up with his right hand and held out his left. Everyone stared at him.

“You’ve gotta be connected to the briefcase in order to travel, dummies,” Five said.

Allison took his hand, a little hesitantly. Luther took hers, and Diego took Luther’s. Then Five opened the briefcase and with a flash of blue light they were gone.

Chapter Text

Klaus turned to Ben. “Hey, thanks for volunteering to stay behind.”

“No problem.”

“Can we uh, go to the opposite end of the house?” Klaus said, still a little shaky.

“Uh sure… why?”

“Because the longer I’m in this room with that damn whiskey the more sure I am that you’re gonna have to unleash the Horror to restrain me.”

“Oh… oh. Okay, let’s go then.”

They walked out into the hall, and Ben looked at the door.

“You know… now that Five’s not here, we could go out into the real world.”

“What if the Commission sees us?”

Ben took his hair out of its ponytail and adjusted it into a man-bun. “Boom. Totally new person.”

Klaus laughed. “Let’s see if we can find some sunglasses or hoodies or hats or something.”

“You really think that’ll fool the Time Police?”

“I dunno. Might.”

Ben shrugged.

“Let’s start with my old room. If I know me I hid tons of shit in there.”

They went up to Klaus’s room and dug around and found nothing.

“Maybe Hargreeves really cleaned everything out,” Ben offered.

“But he missed my carving. He couldn’t’ve been that thorough,” Klaus replied, and then something struck him. Allison said she found the second journal in a drawer with a false bottom. “Maybe I took after my old man…”

He went back to the chest of drawers and opened the bottom drawer. He fiddled a bit with the bottom and finally got it opened.

“Wow.”

Ben looked over Klaus’s shoulders. “That’s a lot of drugs.”

It was mostly weed, plus a grinder, a tiny bong (that Klaus thought was kind of adorable in a way), and a lighter. There were also two baggies with colorful pills in them.

“We should flush this,” Klaus said. “The pills at least.”

“Yeah that’s fair.”

They flushed the pills down the toilet and then went to the middle drawer. The false bottom of that drawer revealed a bunch of clothes in teenage Klaus’s style, and half-used decade old makeup and nail polish.

“Hell yeah.”

~~~

Five, Luther, Diego, and Allison all appeared in Hotel Oblivion’s lobby.

“Welcome to the moon,” Five said.

“It looks just like Earth,” Diego replied, ever the skeptic.

“Why don’t you go out those doors, then?”

“Alright, I will.”

Diego opened the door and stepped onto the surface of the moon. He gaped as he looked up at the curved surface of the dome that was keeping him and his siblings alive. Allison and Luther came after him, and then Five. Luther stepped the most cautiously into the gray dirt.

“This is crazy,” he said.

“You’ve stepped on moon dust before, Spaceboy.”

“Why is the gravity so similar to Earth’s?” Allison asked.

“Artificial gravity machine I assume.”

Diego jumped and made it a little higher than normal. “Hmm. Not quite Earth gravity.”

“I wonder if it’s breaking down a bit after so many years…” Five volunteered.

“Let’s go back inside and look around,” Allison said.

“Yeah, we should make sure everyone else here is dead…” Luther agreed.

They went back inside and split into teams- Diego & Five, Allison & Luther. The former would take the upper floors and the latter would take the lower floors.

All four got to see first-hand how this wasn’t a normal hotel, and it wasn’t helped by the fact that half the lights had burned out. On the ground floor Allison and Luther found an abandoned cafeteria and kitchen, with plenty of moldy food. They also found an empty swimming pool, and several locked doors. One unlocked door led to what looked like a back-alley surgery room. A rusty, disgusting chair in the middle with straps to keep the patient down. One light in the ceiling. Tools covered with dried red something.

On the upper floors, Diego and Five found the rooms and cells. The fifth floor looked almost like a normal hotel, with normal hotel rooms. The 6th had empty cells, with the laser bars Five and Klaus had discovered turned off.

“This place is creeping me out…” Diego said to break the silence.

“Of course it is. Dad didn’t exactly design it to be Lunar DisneyLand.”

“Why are all the cells empty though? You’d at least expect… bodies.”

Five shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe dad might’ve disintegrated them.”

There was another awkward pause. They went into the staircase at the end of the hall and up to the 7th floor, which was just a big, empty ballroom.

“Why do you call Hargreeves ‘dad?’” Diego asked.

“He was my father.”

“He was a pretty shit father.”

“Unfortunately he was the one I was stuck with.”

Diego didn’t pry anymore.

On the 13th floor, which was like the 6th, they found a corpse, but it wasn’t human. One of the laser bars of its cell was still flickering on and off.

“Five, what the hell is that?”

“I don’t know…” He looked at the corpse, half shrouded in darkness.

“You think it’s dead?”

“I’m almost certain.”

Five inched closer to it until he was right in front of a broken pedestal where lasers should’ve been keeping the corpse in.

“Are you sure you should get that close?”

Five didn’t respond.

“If only all the lights were on… or one of us had glowy powers…” Diego continued.

“Yeah Vanya would be helpful right now…”

“Or Klaus and his glowy hands…”

Five suddenly stopped and blinked. “Wait. My hands glow.”

“They do? They don’t glow when you blink.”

“They glow when I’m time traveling.”

“Can you make ‘em glow and not time travel?”

Five thought this over for a second. “I might be able to… by starting the math problem but not finishing it… Hold the briefcase.”

Five handed the briefcase to Diego, blinked past the pedestal, and slowly walked over to the body in the cell. He then held his fists near the creature’s face and they glowed blue.

It was an alien alright. Pinkish skin with tentacles coming out of its face, and a mouth with too many teeth. Its flesh was rotting away and you could see bits of skull. Diego had seen a lot of gross and fucked up shit as a cop, and Five had seen a lot of gross and fucked up shit over the course of his life, but all that gross fucked-up shit did not compare to this.

Five stepped back and released his hands.

“That’s horrifying. That’s-- that’s the grossest shit I’ve ever seen,” Diego stammered.

Five blinked out of the cell, his face pale.

“Now I know why Klaus didn’t want to come.”

“What? Why?”

“That alien’s ghost might still be here.”

~~~

Dressed like 17-year-old Klaus, Klaus and Ben left the mansion out the back.

“Where do you want to go?” Klaus asked.

“I want to get clothes that don’t make me look like a neon sign.”

Klaus rolled his eyes. “I was a teenager, okay? We all had to get it out of our systems.”

“You still kind of dress like this.”

“I think I have a little more restraint.”

“We shouldn’t just stand here…”

“You’re right. Let’s go to Gimbel’s, huh? When’s the last time you went clothes shopping?”

“Not in years… but I don’t really have… money…”

“It’s okay, I’ll pay. You can pay me back later.”

Ben didn’t know how to bring up the fact that he’d been living on the old man’s savings and he was almost out. Hey, maybe after this was over Klaus could help him get a job or something.

They walked to Gimbel’s and went to the men’s section and Ben started picking out clothes, mostly black and gray.

“Don’t you want any colors at all?”

“I like black.”

“So you’re gonna give me shit for dressing like a high-lighter but then you’re gonna pull a full emo?”

“It’s not emo, it's just black.”

Klaus rolled his eyes, but he had a crooked smile on his face. “Fine. Your clothes should make you happy and if dressing like a black hole makes you happy then do it.”

Klaus’s eyes were then drawn to a tank-top with a sunset on it, and some leather pants.

“Ooo…” he said. “Maybe I’ll do some shopping too…”

After Ben picked out the items he wanted, he started walking towards check-out.

“What are you doing?” Klaus asked.

“Going to pay?”

“You have to try them on first, dummy.”

Ben bit his lip. “I don’t like…” he lowered his voice, “uncovering the portal area in public…”

“It’s not in public, it’s in a little dressing room. And think about all the progress you’ve made the past few days!”

Ben hemmed and hawed.

“Look, if you really don’t wanna do it I’m not gonna force you. I will try on these things though, myself,” Klaus said, holding up his items. He started walking towards the dressing room and Ben followed.

“Fine. I’ll try them on. I don’t want to buy something that doesn’t fit, anyways…”

~~~

Five and Diego crept further down the hallway. There were more corpses in some of the cells, but they didn’t all look the same.

“Did we fight all these guys?” Diego asked.

“I don’t know…”

“Also you said ‘alien’ earlier…”

“Do they look like they’re from Earth to you?”

“No… but… mutants, maybe? Isn’t Luther sort of a mutant?”

“I don’t think they’re mutants. Dad was always interested in primates, not… whatever these things are.”

“Maybe they’re from before we were born.”

“I don’t know, Diego, I just don’t know…”

~~~

Allison and Luther made their way to the second floor.

“This place is giving me the heebie-jeebies,” Luther said to break the tension.

“It’d give anyone the heebie-jeebies…”

They passed under a broken light into a patch of darkness and Allison sighed.

“I can’t rumor inanimate objects or I’d fix this lighting problem like that,” she said with a snap.

“That would be nice.”

They passed by a room with an oval window and the pair looked inside.

“You know what those walls look like?” Allison asked.

“No.”

“Studio foam…”

“What?”

“You know, the stuff recording studios cover their walls in to dampen sound and get the best quality.”

“Hmm,” Luther said, before taking the wheel doorknob and forcing the door open. The two stepped inside and immediately they could both feel the quieting effects.

There was a moment of silence before Allison gasped.

“What?”

“Didn’t Five mention that Hargreeves built a prison for Vanya under the mansion?”

“Oh yeah…”

“And Vanya has sound powers?”

“So this is a second prison for her on the moon?”

“I think it might be. Let’s go back to the lobby and get Diego and Five. They’ve both been there so they can confirm it.”

~~~

Diego and Five, both thoroughly creeped the fuck out, made their way back to the lobby post haste to wait for their brother and sister.

“Maybe we shouldn’t bring Vanya here,” Diego said, a bead of sweat forming on his forehead.

“Get it together, wouldya? They’re all dead! There’s no living things here ‘cept us, and Vanya’s on our side, remember?”

“Yeah, I know, I know. I-I’m worried about Klaus, that’s all.”

“I’m worried about him too, but there’s nothing we can do about it.”

Luther and Allison came into the lobby and explained the eerie soundproof room situation. They took Diego and Five there and they confirmed it was indeed exactly like Vanya’s prison.

“Why did he have to build one on the moon if he already had one on Earth?” Diego asked.

“In case the Earth one couldn’t contain her, idiot,” Five replied.

“I thought a drink or two would calm him down,” Diego whispered to Luther.

Luther did a tiny shrug. “Maybe he’s a mean drunk?”

“We should head back,” Allison said. “Is there anything else here to do?”

“Bury the corpses?” Diego asked.

“Uh, what corpses???”

“We found bodies,” Five answered, “in broken cells. They looked alien. I wouldn’t touch them if I were you. They were rotting and looked nasty and I don’t know what alien germs would do to us.”

“Where were they?”

“13th floor.”

“Of course it was 13,” Luther muttered.

“Let’s go back already, alright?” Diego said.

~~~

First, Ben did a fashion show for Klaus. He’d never done anything like that before, but he had a good time picking out a new leather jacket, boots, and some black jeans that looked real sharp. Klaus did a shorter fashion show next, and picked out a few items for himself. Then they checked out and walked out with their bags.

Klaus sighed. “We should probably head back. We don’t want to get there after Five.”

“Yeah… what are we gonna do with these clothes though?”

“We can store them in our old rooms until after this is all over. Five probably won’t go in there. We should also go in through the entrance in the alley with the ladder in case they’re already back.”

“I bet you did all the sneaking around when we were kids.”

“Did you see all that weed? Of course I did.”

“You know, I was wondering, what would happen if you smoked that now? It’s 12 years old right.”

“I dunno. Nobody ever waited 12 years to smoke weed in the crowds I ran in. It’s not wine.”

“Also… Diego’s a cop. Should we get rid of it?”

“Is it legal in this state yet? I can’t keep track anymore.”

They snuck back into the house and stashed their clothes in Klaus’s closet. They went out to the hallway overlooking the hall.

“Did we beat them back?” Ben asked.

Suddenly, there was a great blue flash from the main room. They rushed downstairs to see their siblings.

“So?” Klaus asked, seeing them all in one piece. The four exchanged looks.

“There’s aliens on the moon,” Five said eventually. “Dead aliens.”

Klaus went a few shades paler. “Well not everyone sticks around on this mortal plane, you know. Some people leave and they’ve probably been dead and alone there for years, you know, maybe they’ve gone into the light.”

“Yeah, it’ll probably be fine, right?” Allison asked hopefully.

“Yeah, totally, totally.”

“Anything else?” Ben asked.

The four explained what they found and drew a map of the hotel on the old whiteboard in English. After that, they had lunch, and then Luther, Allison, and Ben went to train for their faux fight (with Klaus there for support). Before Five could disappear, Diego asked him a question.

“Did Hargreeves have any magnets?”

“Magnets?? I’m sure he had magnets. Check his workshop.”

“Where is that?”

Five sighed and begrudgingly showed Diego the workshop where he had destroyed the briefcase’s tracking mechanism. Then he fucked off to do whatever he wanted to do, and Diego dug around for the biggest magnet he could find. He then went up to his old bedroom and put the magnet on the dresser, and took a bullet out of his gun. Vanya’s telekinesis wouldn’t override his trajectory manipulation this time.

~~~

Vanya picked up the violin and practiced what was supposed to be her Earth-ending song. She also tried, with some difficulty, to keep the room from shaking while she did it. She was nervous, and it made it harder to control her powers, especially when it came to the violin. It was her wand, her staff. The Handler showed her the story of her and her violin years ago. How it belonged to her father, and he let her borrow it when her pompous siblings were out on some mission (she shook her head, her siblings were assholes but they weren’t the people the Handler told her they were-- she’d have to rewrite how she thinks of them). It was her tool in her most effective world-wipeout.

And she’d be playing it at the park tomorrow when her siblings came. She hoped she wouldn’t fulfill her destiny to end the world before they got there.

And most of all, she just hoped Five was right. She didn’t want to have a destiny.

Chapter Text

Klaus’s stomach grumbled. He’d spent a full afternoon getting fighting tips from Luther and Allison so he could more convincingly fake fight Vanya, and emotionally supporting Ben as he learned to get better control over the Horror. Ben still wasn’t ready to unleash more than one tentacle at a time and stay in control, but he felt at least a little more certain that he could control one at a time and not hurt or kill anyone.

“Anyone else getting hungry?” Klaus asked Luther, Allison, and Ben. “I could really go for some Chinese take-out before the world ends.”

“I could eat,” Luther said.

“Let’s go back upstairs and find everyone and convince Five that Chinese food isn’t going to send a red alert to the Commission.”

The four went upstairs, and Klaus took finding-Diego duty. He searched around the house calling Diego’s name when he heard some grunting and whooshing sounds coming from Diego’s bedroom. He knocked and opened the door and saw Diego pulling a bullet away from the biggest magnet he ever saw. Diego let go when he saw Klaus and the bullet immediately pinged to the magnet.

“Uh, hi,” Klaus said, a little confused. “We’re gonna order some dinner.”

“Oh, sounds great,” Diego said, a little relieved. He went and pulled the bullet off the magnet and quickly put it back into his gun, before following Klaus out.

“What were you doing?”

“Oh, just, uh… practicing.”

Klaus eyed his brother. “Are you planning on… shooting Vanya?”

“No! Absolutely not. I don’t want to kill her.”

“Good, because I think if you kill her, Five will immediately turn around and kill you.”

The brothers just laughed it off after that, but Klaus couldn’t help but wonder what his brother was up to.

Five did agree to takeout, under the condition they put in the order with a fake name. Dinner was actually kind of fun, everyone together but Vanya eating and joking around. Five missed Vanya, and wished she could be here joking and bonding with her siblings before tomorrow. He just hoped everyone knew she was on their side.

Vanya, in the meantime, went to a nearby convenience store to buy a cup of soup for dinner. She microwaved it in the scummy looking motel microwave (while wondering if radiation from it could do anything to her, because she already had powers) and then ate alone. In two days, if all went well, perhaps she could eat dinner with her family, no more secrets between them. She could just be herself, maybe for the first time.

As evening turned to night, the Hargreeves siblings went to sleep. Less than 24 hours until showtime. After tomorrow, no matter what happened, everything would be different.

~~~

Ben thought he was the first one awake in the house. It wasn’t just that he was an early riser (when he wasn’t in the depths of depression), but that he picked a sofa to sleep on with an east facing window. Lucky him. Even as sunbeams hit the mansion floors in an almost idyllic way, Ben felt an uneasiness in his gut. There were ghosts here. You didn’t need to be Klaus in order to sense that.

They had only scratched the surface of their pasts, and Ben had only scratched the surface of his powers. What if he hurt Vanya today? What if he hurt someone else?

He walked down a hallway when he suddenly heard noises. People talking. Were the others up already? Maybe it was Luther and Five. Ben saw a door that was cracked open, and the noises were coming from behind it. He opened the door and saw Diego with a cup of coffee watching one of the dozens of little TV screens.

“What is this?” Ben asked.

Diego suddenly whipped around and was holding a knife out right at him. Ben’s hands shot in the air.

“Oh, it’s you,” Diego said, and then he yawned. “Don’t sneak up on me like that.”

Ben walked into the tiny security room and stood behind Diego. “What are you watching?”

“Currently? Us.”

Ben raised an eyebrow. Diego looked slightly paler than usual and had bags under his eyes. “Did you sleep okay?”

“No. Eventually I stopped trying.”

“Oh… Also, what do you mean ‘us?’”

Diego pointed at the screen and Ben looked closer and saw two boys in blue uniforms playing with a creepy Teddy Ruxpin bear.

“Make it say ‘Luther’s a spacebooger!’” The boy who looked like Diego said. “No, wait wait, make it say, make it say ‘Luther, more like ‘loser!’” The boy then erupted into laughter.

“How about ‘Luther sniffs dad’s underwear?’” The Ben-looking boy said.

Little Diego stopped chortling at his own joke for a moment, and then lit up. “Benaroo, that’s perfect!”

Adult Ben and Diego looked at each other.

“Is this what you imagined your childhood was like?” Diego asked.

“In a way. I always imagined I was locked up somewhere and then escaped…”

“Oh…”

“What did you imagine?”

“It changed, you know? At first I imagined I had parents who missed me. That whole first year I was scouring newspapers for missing persons trying to see if any fit my description. I imagined a little house, a yard, a dog, siblings, the whole normal American childhood. When I was in the police academy I lied and started telling people I was totally the illegitimate son of nobility. Eventually I gave up and realized I was probably an orphan no one wanted… guess I was kind of right.”

“Well… the truth isn’t that sad. It might not be normal but we have family now.”

“Do we? When this is all over, aren’t we just gonna go back to our jobs and our lives?”

Ben looked away. He didn’t have a life to go back to. “Do you want to?”

“Well, Allison’s an asshole, Five’s an asshole, Luther rubs me the wrong way for some reason…”

“Seriously?”

“Alright, alright. I wouldn’t be opposed to staying in touch,” Diego said, and then he yawned.

“You wanna get a coffee refill and some breakfast?”

“Yeah ok.”

~~~

Everyone’s stomachs were tense as the day passed. Five got his stress out by pacing around the entire mansion and muttering to himself. Vanya went to the shitty exercise room the motel had and ran on the treadmill, and practiced her violin some more. The other trained more for their fake fight. Klaus had Diego give him tips on how to throw and block punches. Ben practiced using his powers, and Luther and Allison practiced their charade. Nobody had much, if anything for lunch, and they skipped dinner.

At 8pm, five of the Hargreeves siblings gathered ominously in the foyer, reading to go to the park where the world might end together. They were just waiting on Five.

“So…” Luther said to break the tension. “What do you guys think is gonna happen?”

“I don’t know,” Klaus responded. “I think Vanya is on our side, but what if the Commission gets her to end the world anyways?”

“And what if she’s not?” Diego asked. “Do we stand a chance at stopping her?”

Allison glanced at her pocket where the pills were still stored but said nothing.

“I’m with Klaus,” Ben said. “I think she’s our sibling and on our side. I think we stand a chance.”

Klaus smiled at his brother. He was so proud of Ben for coming so far.

Five walked into the foyer, holding the briefcase, and looked stoically at his siblings.

“Before missions when we were kids, dad would always make Luther give us a final brief, sometimes even when we were on our way there. I can’t speak for any of you, but the calm before the storm was often the worst part for me… unless we messed up, in which case the car ride home was the worst part. Today, if there’s a car ride home, it’ll mean we didn’t mess up.”

Five then walked past his siblings and to the door.

“Wait, aren’t you going to brief us?” Luther asked.

“We’re still taking Vanya to the moon.”

~~~

Six members of the Umbrella Academy walked to Midway Park in silence, as evening approached and the sun began to set. Five was cursing himself for not sneaking Vanya back into the academy to practice their fight with her before show time. On the other hand, maybe the lack of practice would make this plan more believable.

They entered the park, which was rather large, and began looking for Vanya.

~~~

Vanya made her way to the park by herself, violin case strapped over her shoulder. She set up by a bench across from the small man-made pond near the center of the park, took out her violin, left the case open so it looked like she was playing for cash, and started playing. She didn’t start with Apocalypse Suite immediately. She played some more recognizable tunes and passersby stopped and threw the occasional coin or bill her way. The sun set. The time neared.

Luther spotted her first, right as she finished a portion of one of Beethoven’s sonatas. Then she spotted them, and launched right into Apocalypse Suite. The music ignited her powers and energy thrummed out of her. A lady yelped when she saw what was happening, and all the strangers around the park ran away from her and her violin. The Umbrella Academy held their ground.

“Alright team,” Five said. “Like we talked about.”

Ben unleashed one of the Horror’s tentacles and flailed it around wildly. The others rushed forward and Luther looked for something to hit Vanya with. Diego pulled out a knife and intentionally manipulated it around her head, but she still took control of it with her telekinesis and sent it flying back to him. His jaw dropped as he quickly took control back and flung the knife into a nearby tree.

Allison ran up to her and started a rumor, but then Vanya hit a loud note and sent Allison flying back. Klaus, who was running up to fake punch her, was also sent back. Five blinked right up to her and dodged her powers and faux punched her a few times before he was sent flying away. Diego pulled out his gun and started shooting at Vanya, intentionally trying to miss, but she still sent the bullets flying back towards him and he had to send them flying away from everyone as beads of sweat started to form on his forehead. Once with the knife was one thing. It was entirely different to send half a dozen bullets flying back at him. Maybe Vanya was just being convincing, but Diego didn’t believe it anymore.

Allison got up running, and Diego re-holstered his gun, and held his hands out towards Allison’s pockets. As she was sent flying back again into the grass, he was able to pull the pill bottle out and it launched right into his hands. He quickly opened it and threw a pill at her, and then took control of its trajectory with his powers and tried to get it into her mouth. Klaus ran up to him.

“Diego, what are you doing?! This isn’t the plan!”

“She nearly killed me!!”

“I’m sure it looked like that--”

“She shot my bullets back at me!”

Five blinked over. “Diego you idiot, she’s on our side! Don’t screw this up!!”

Vanya, while still playing the violin, was engaged in a tug-of-war with Diego, the pill hovering inches from her face. That’s when Luther seemed to hit her on the back of the head with an absolutely massive rock. She fell forward, and for one second the others weren’t sure if Luther had actually killed her. Ben retracted the Horror. Five blinked to her and saw her chest move up and down, and then looked up at his brother.

“Grab Allison, let’s go.”

Luther grabbed Allison, and Diego grabbed Vanya, and they all held each other’s hands in a circle. They all seemed to take a collective deep breath, and then Five opened the briefcase.

~~~

Screams. Screams of the dead. Klaus let go of Ben and Diego’s hands and dropped to his knees and screamed himself. He hadn’t met any ghosts like this in years. Not since the incident in the alley all those years ago.

All the ghosts here were different, but their screams were the same. Horror, pain, anger, revenge, guilt, anger, anger, anger. There were aliens. A man with an eyeball for a head. A spider-person with 6 spider limbs and 4 human limbs. Cat people. There were also humans in supervillain costumes. Bee costumes, cowboys, hats, and capes. A very shiny sequin-covered man. One of them raged louder than the rest. A skinny-as-death-man in an orange jumpsuit and metal helmet, with some kind of circular device in his chest.

“I’M DOCTOR TERMINAL AND I AM SO HUNGRY!!!” the man cried out.

Outside of Klaus’s mind, his siblings were looking on in concern.

“What’s happening to him?” Ben cried out with worry.

“Too many ghosts,” Five said hauntingly. “He’s experiencing too many unhappy ghosts.”

“How do we stop it?”

“I don’t know. The only way dad stopped it was by removing him from the place with the ghosts.”

“Then let’s send him back to Earth!” Allison cried indignantly.

“Alone?” Five yelled back.

“I’m on the moon now,” Vanya said. “Why can’t we send him back.”

Klaus screamed, and then, as tears rolled down his face, he cried out: “I’m so sorry… he’s too hungry!” And then the rest of them saw Dr. Terminal too, glowing blue, and he started attempting to eat the hotel. Klaus strained as he tried to hold him back, and covered his ears.

“I don’t know how long I can hold him off,” he said, breathing shakily.

“Klaus, how many ghosts are there…?” Luther asked.

Before Klaus could answer, there was a blue flash and a stylish middle aged woman only Five and Vanya recognized appeared with a briefcase, and both of them looked at her in shock.

“Well well well,” the Handler said. “If it isn’t my darling daughter, Five, and the rest of the clown school…”

“Five, who is that?” Diego asked.

“I’m the Handler, Number 2.”

“What did she just call me??”

“I’m not your daughter,” Vanya interrupted. “I’m not anyone’s daughter!”

Flashes of blue figures surrounded them, coming in and out of phase. For a split second, the Handler almost looked as nervous as the rest of them. Klaus was still on his knees, struggling to keep the ghosts back.

“Anyways, I’m here to pick you up, Vanya,” The Handler said in a chipper voice. “Time to end the world, remember?”

“How did you even get here??” Five asked.

The Handler rolled her eyes. “You think I don’t know all about your little plot? I’ve planned everything. After all the timelines you and your family have caused, after all the struggle and strife, I finally made a timeline where I and the Commission have complete control.”

“And that was your mistake,” Vanya said, her eyes narrowing.

“Mistake? My love, all those annoying timelines gave me all the information I needed about all of you. I know what moves you’ll make next in any situation.”

“You didn’t let me finish,” Vanya said, through gritted teeth. “In all those timelines you showed me, you know what caused the apocalypse? My lack of control. You, and all your infinite wisdom about me and my powers, actually taught me about them and gave me the control I never had.”

“Darling I--”

“STOP CALLING ME DARLING!!” Vanya yelled. Her eyes flared white and she pushed a white pulse of energy out of her and bleached part of her shirt.

Five looked between the Handler and Vanya, and Klaus and Dr. Terminal, and grabbed all his other siblings in a huddle.

“I’m worried the apocalypse is still on,” he whispered quickly.

“What?? But we got Vanya to the moon!” Diego whispered back.

“Her clothes are turning white!” Five cried as he glanced at Vanya. “Dad’s journal never mentioned that and she’s never done it before! And what about Dr. Terminal??”

Blue figures flashed in and out again. Everyone could see them move.

“That’s really starting to freak me out, Five,” Ben said.

“Me too,” Allison added.

“Who are they?” Luther asked.

“They’re the ghosts of everyone the Umbrella Academy ever beat,” Five answered. “I think I saw the Sequin Skull…”

“Guys!! HELP!” Klaus cried out, as Dr. Terminal broke free and started sucking up loose objects in the lobby. Five lunged for the briefcase and held onto it tight.

“Five, what do we do??” Ben asked, completely distraught.

Five looked at the chaos around him. His former boss, his two siblings in pain, the ghost he could see, and the hundreds he knew he couldn’t.

The Handler was still standing against Vanya’s energy blasts, but he could tell she was weakening. Vanya’s clothing was completely bleached white, and she looked paler than anyone Five had ever seen.

“Vanya’s got the Handler covered. We need to help Klaus,” he said. He looked at Diego. “Do you trust me?”

An energy tentacle came out of Vanya and lifted the Handler into the air as her life force was sucked out of her and her cheeks became hollow.

“Yeah, Five,” Diego answered. “I trust you.”

“YOU LIED AND MANIPULATED ME!” Vanya yelled at the Handler. “YOU PREPARED ME TO KILL EVERYONE, AND FOR WHAT?!”

“T-the timeline!” the Handler squeaked out. “Don’t you care about the timeline?!”

“NO!!” More energy blasted out of her, knocking Klaus down. He laid unconscious on the ground, and Dr. Terminal had disappeared in the chaos. His siblings got to their feet and rushed to him, Five, unthinkingly, left the briefcase on the ground.

“YOU KNOW WHO REALLY CARES ABOUT THE TIMELINE??” Vanya asked the Handler, tears forming around her eyes. “FIVE. HE’S THE ONLY PERSON WHO ACTUALLY CARED ABOUT ME!”

“But the rest of them don’t, do they?” the Handler choked.

Vanya hesitated for a moment, and turned to look at her siblings. Klaus, who flew to Russia and back in a day for her. Diego, who just tried to drug her up again. They all did try to apologize though, and they did accept her.

“I think they do.”

And with that, she squeezed the Handler up and dropped her body to the ground. Everyone but Five looked away.

“I’m done taking your orders,” Vanya said breathily, still frazzled.

Then, they all started to be sucked up into the air.

“Five, what happened to the gravity??” Luther asked.

“Moon gravity isn’t even supposed to be this low,” Diego added.

“MORE!!! MORE!!!!!!” A voice several floors above them yelled.

“It’s Dr. Terminal,” Five said quietly. “He’s consuming the entire hotel.”

He tried to blink to the briefcase, but missed it by too much to grab.

“I can’t blink accurately here!” Five cried out as he started getting sucked up further away from it. “The lack of gravity is throwing my calculations off!”

All the siblings (minus Klaus) leaped into action, trying to get to the briefcase as they were sucked up faster and faster. Allison tried to bounce herself off a wall to get to it, and Ben hastily attempted to use the Horror to grab it, but his fine motor skills with the Horror were still too weak.

Diego looked at his siblings. Vanya was still too worked up, and Luther was too big. He took a deep breath, held his hands out, and got the briefcase to move back towards him and caught it.

“Woo! Diego!!” Luther cried out.

“I have to get the rest of you all now!” Diego yelled back. “Everyone come towards me!”

Five blinked a few feet away from Diego, and then Diego pulled him in, and Five latched onto his calf. Diego got Klaus next, and Five held onto his other brother. Allison launched herself at him. Ben stuck the Horror to the wall and swung himself towards Diego, who caught him. And finally Luther launched himself at his siblings, and Diego pulled him too hard and sent the group careening into some rubble.

Five grabbed the briefcase from Diego, and Klaus started to wake up.

“Wait…” Klaus said. “He’s going to destroy the moon…”

“Yeah, Five, we can’t just leave him here to destroy everything!” Allison cried.

The floor/roof above them was sucked up and they all saw the massive, now balloon-like Dr. Terminal above them. As his siblings screamed, Five opened the briefcase and whispered, almost to himself, “Not if Klaus isn’t here.”

~~~

The seven siblings appeared, still screaming, into the main room of the Umbrella Academy, and the gravity of Earth hit them like a brick and they collapsed into a pile. Five quickly untangled himself and ran out the front door and saw the moon, a sliver of a waning crescent, still in the sky. Did they do it?

Allison came out of the front door.

“The moon’s still there,” she said.

“Yeah.”

“What time is it?”

Five’s jaw dropped. “I nearly forgot. I programmed the briefcase to take us back to Earth at 12:01am, Tuesday April 2nd.”

“So it’s the second?” Allison asked, excitedly.

“I don’t know, those things were always finicky. We have to check.”

The pair ran back inside.

“MOM!” Five yelled in the entrance hall. Grace appeared.

“What time is it?”

“It is currently 12:02:16am Eastern Daylight Time, Tuesday April 2nd, 2019.”

“We did it,” Five said in disbelief.

Luther and Diego came out into the hall.

“Did you just say we did it?” Diego asked.

“We did it!!” Allison cried with happiness.

Luther hugged Diego until Diego nearly choked. They all ran back to tell Ben, Klaus, and Vanya. Ben hugged Klaus, who was still extremely drained, but happy, and Vanya showed no change in emotion.

“What’s your problem?” Diego asked. “We did it! Also, uh, sorry about kind of… not believing that you were on our side… you did shoot bullets at me.”

“You shot bullets at me first,” Vanya retorted, but without any passion.

“Touche.”

“But that’s not my problem is. My problem is that the date of the apocalypse isn’t set in stone. It might still happen.”

The Hargreeves quieted.

“Maybe in other timelines, but the one in this timeline is over,” Five reasoned.

“How are you sure?”

“I don’t think we can ever be 100% sure, especially since the Commission is still around, probably biding their time until they come back for us,” Five said.

There was an awkward pause.

“Wait, that's it?” Diego asked. “No ‘but?’”

“But what?”

“But ‘we can handle those assholes’ or something?”

“I guess we’ll find out if and when we cross that bridge,” Five said with a shrug. “Anyone want a celebratory drink?”

“Yes please,” Allison said.

“Me too,” Vanya added.

“I would like to sleep for the next 48 hours,” Klaus said loopily.

“I’m gonna take him to bed, I think,” Luther said, scooping his lanky brother up.

“That does seem like the smart thing to do,” Five commented.

~~~

When Luther came back from putting Klaus to bed they all shared a drink, and then the moment came Ben was so worried about.

“So… are you all just gonna go back to your lives now?” he asked quietly.

“I don’t think I can,” Vanya said.

“You already know I don’t want to,” Diego said with a small smile. “I mean, I want to stay in touch. It’d be nice to have a family.”

“Yeah,” Luther agreed. “I’m not gonna quit the circus, but when I’m in town we’ll have to get together, right?”

“I’d like to stay in touch too,” Allison added.

“Do you think I could move here?” Ben asked Five.

“Why couldn’t you?”

“I might too,” Vanya said. “Everything I have in Russia is because of the Handler and the Commission. I want to start my own life.”

“So you, me, and Five would be roommates!” Ben said cheerily.

“I might stay here too when I’m in town,” Luther added.

“And the rest of us could come on holidays,” Allison chipped in.

As the rest of his siblings made plans for future get-togethers, Five looked on, feeling a little bittersweet. His goal of 45 years was complete, and one can’t help but feel a little empty when the thing you’ve been striving after for that long is finally in your hands. On the other hand… he had a new goal now, the same goal as the rest of his siblings: be a family. A real family this time.

~~~

They woke Klaus up for dinner that night and had a big homemade meal by Grace. She, and Pogo, of course, were invited to eat with the rest of them. Klaus, by this time, had called Aaron and assured him that everyone was safe, and he’d be home the following day. He also promised to introduce him to the whole family as soon as possible.

It was a big, loud, warm meal, unlike anything all of them had ever experienced. Multiple conversations going on at once, with participants and topics flowing in and out with ease. Afterwards, Five made his way up to his old bedroom, and sat on his bed to look out of the window at the moon. Klaus followed and sat down next to him.

“We did it,” Klaus said.

“I’m sorry about what happened on the moon… maybe you shouldn’t have come.”

“What’s done is done,” Klaus replied. He didn’t want to lie to his brother and tell him it wasn’t a terrible experience, but on the other hand he didn’t want to make Five feel worse. “What are we gonna do about Dr. Terminal though, and the rest of them?”

“There’s not much we can do, unless you know of a way to get rid of ghosts for good.”

“Well, ghosts can choose to go into the light and the next realm, but I’ve never forced one to.”

“So, uh, don’t go to the moon again. We got out of there at the last possible moment before Dr. Terminal would’ve killed us.”

Klaus chuckled. “Alright, I’ll cancel my moon vacation plans then… What about your altered briefcase? Are you going to destroy it?”

Five sighed. “No. I’m going to hold onto it. If the Handler could get to the moon it means the rest of the Commission can. I don’t want them to be the only ones with that power.”

Klaus nodded. “So… what are you going to do next? Take down the Commission?”

“If I kill the board, someone will fill the power vacuum. It’s not something I could do alone, anyways. If they come after you guys though…” Five grabbed the blanket and scrunched it tight.

“Alright, alright.”

There was a moment of silence between the brothers.

“Hm…” Klaus thought out loud. “You know what I would do now, if I were you?”

“What?”

“Grow up.”

“I’m already grown up.”

“I know, but you have a chance to do it again, better this time. I think a lot of people would do anything for the opportunity you have.”

Klaus got up, and left Five alone with his thoughts.

~~~

There were reports, of course, of a light show and a fight in Midway Park, at 8:30pm April 1st, 2019. The city police couldn’t ever seem to find out who was responsible, though.

There were also secretive NASA reports about disturbances on the moon that night. Their investigations also hit roadblocks, and after a while no one thought of it much besides tinfoil hat conspiracy theorists.

What was left of Hotel Oblivion was quiet and dead once again. No one alive dared go back.

As for the Commission, Five waited for them to show up again, but they didn’t. Perhaps they gave up on this timeline, and some other version Handler was out there manipulating some other version of his family. Five just hoped that timeline’s Five would succeed like he did. There wasn’t much he could really do about it.

Besides… he was actually kind of happy here. Vanya immigrated to the United States, Ben sold the old man’s house and moved into the mansion. Five and Pogo made up. Grace enjoyed being able to be a mother again, even if her children were grown up. The house wasn’t full (Allison, Diego, Luther, and Klaus weren’t staying over most of the time), but Five didn’t mind that. It made his time with his other siblings more special.

He never did find a way to reverse his sibling’s amnesia, and they all came to accept that in their own time. Vanya told him in private that she didn’t really want her old memories back, based on what she saw. She enjoyed making new ones.

That summer, after getting sick of sweating through his button-ups, Five put on a t-shirt, jeans, and sneakers. He was ready to try being 13 again.

THE END

Chapter Text

Five had never seen the house decorated in such a festive and cheerful way. Reginald wasn’t exactly the type to allow the children to customize any part of the house that wasn’t their room, even for a day. Hence, their only Reginald-approved birthday celebration was a slice of cake after dinner. Any other partying they did (mostly donuts and soda, at least while he was around) was in secret. This is why it was incredibly weird to see a huge “HAPPY BIRTHDAY” banner above the main staircase on October 1st, 2019. Five, Ben, and Vanya had helped with the decorations a bit, but most of the credit had to go to Grace.

Five, although he would never admit it, couldn’t wait for the rest of his siblings to arrive that afternoon. It would be the first time in 45 years that he actually celebrated his birthday.

He walked outside to the courtyard area and saw a rented bouncy castle being blown up by the guys who worked for the rental company. Even though the trio of siblings who lived at the mansion full time tried to convince Grace that their 30th (or 59th) birthday should be more adult, Grace insisted on making it a children’s party, with the line “you all missed out on proper childhood birthday parties. At least let me throw you one.” Eventually they stopped trying and let Grace do her thing. Five had never been in a bouncy house before… maybe it would be… fun?

He went to breakfast and saw Ben grasping a spatula with the Horror to flip over a pancake. Ben then looked at Five proudly.

“Good job,” Five said, unable to hold back a smile. “I wonder where mom is.”

“She’s dealing with the magician.”

“She got a magician…?”

“Well right now she’s not sure if he’s coming, so she might have gotten a magician.”

Five rolled his eyes, but he still had a smile on his face.

“Have you seen Vanya yet?”

“No, I haven’t.”

~~~

Viktor looked at himself in the mirror. For someone who never cut hair before, let alone his own, he thought it looked pretty damn good. For some reason he felt a sinking feeling in his gut, though. Was it wrong to do this today? Was he making their shared birthday all about himself?

Viktor had had… gender feelings for a while now. He just never really got a chance to process it until after he moved to the U.S. In Russia he had a public image to uphold as a master violinist, and he didn’t know what the hell the Commission would think. Now, though, he was free. He joined a small company that gave music lessons and started teaching violin, and he really enjoyed it. He hadn’t joined an orchestra in the U.S. yet though. Maybe he would after today, now that he could do it as himself.

He was also worried about what his family would think. He knew Klaus was queer and nonbinary so he should have no reason to worry about what they’d say, but he did anyways. They all saw him as their sister, what if they refused to change their minds?

~~~

Five changed into a white polo shirt and khaki pants and helped Grace set up for a while, before going to greet his siblings. Klaus and Aaron arrived first. Five had met Aaron a few times by now, and by all accounts Aaron fit in with the family just fine (even if he came off a little fanboyish the first time he met them all). Diego was next with Eudora Patch, the other cop who tried to arrest Five all those months ago (with the Commission out of the way, Diego was able to clear Five’s supposed record easily). Luther came next, and then Allison, without her soon-to-be-ex-husband (Allison had been making quite a lot of changes to her life throughout the past months, and the divorce was apparently amiable on both sides, from what Five heard).

They all were outside, catching up, in the crisp fall air. They all got lucky; it was a bright day, and just over 60 degrees fahrenheit.

15 minutes post-Allison’s arrival, Vanya's absence became too noticeable. Nobody who lived at the house had seen Vanya all day. Just as Klaus suggested searching the house, their sibling walked out into the courtyard.

“Hi,” he said shyly.

“Vanny, your hair!” Klaus exclaimed. “I love it!”

“It’s-- it’s Viktor actually. I--”

Before he could continue, Klaus beamed and rushed up to hug his brother. His other siblings came over to join the hug too.

“I hope this isn’t too weird,” Viktor said afterward he let go.

“Why would it be weird?” Klaus asked. “Nothing’s weird about being yourself.”

Viktor looked at his other siblings and they all smiled back at him.

“Y’know, we’ve been waiting for you to get the party started,” Klaus continued. “I’ve been holding back the urge to jump into the bounce house for nearly an hour.”

Viktor giggled, and then Klaus ran over to the bounce house, took off his shoes and went inside.

“Klaus, how old are you??” Diego said with crossed arms.

“I’m 30, Diego,” Klaus said matter-of-factly. “And I couldn’t be happier.”

Viktor laughed harder, and then joined his brother in the bouncy house.

“I’m not letting you two have all the fun!” Ben cried out, clamoring after them.

All of them thought that this was the best birthday they could remember, even if it was pretty cheesy. The magician came through after all, and even Five, the biggest skeptic in the world, had to admit that the guy was entertaining, and he couldn’t figure out all of the tricks. They had pizza and cake, and as the evening winded down, nobody wanted to be the first to leave.

“I thought this would be so weird and ruin everything,” Viktor said to Five when they had a moment alone.

“Why would you think that?” Five asked.

“I don’t know. But I’m so glad I finally did it. I feel lighter than I ever have.”

“Even though you can fly.”

Viktor snorted, and elbowed his brother.

“You don’t even know what it was like to be me,” Viktor said, more seriously. “You know what the Commission was like but you were just a normal assassin.”

“I was a very, very good assassin.”

“You didn’t have the fate of the world on your shoulders. For 12 years I was the chosen one who was supposed to end the world. You never felt that pressure.”

“You think I didn’t feel that pressure? For 45 years I was the only one who could save the world, whether or not I was explicitly chosen. The universe chose me.”

Viktor sighed shortly and looked away.

“Sorry…” Five said quietly. “I shouldn’t be making it a competition…”

Viktor looked up at his siblings. “I don’t think they realize how lucky they are.”

“Viktor… I think you need to realize how lucky we are. We got out alive. In all your time at the Commission, did you ever see anyone again who retired?”

Some of the color drained from Viktor’s face. “No, I didn’t.”

“I’m still… I guess… coming to terms with our freedom. You should start doing that too.”

“Has Klaus been bugging you about going to therapy?”

“Yeah. I don’t know how the fuck I’d explain my situation to a therapist, though.”

“Me neither…”

“FIVE! VIKTOR!” Klaus called out from across the courtyard. The old whiteboard had been brought outside. “We’re gonna play Pictionary, wanna join??”

The brothers looked at each other.

“Yeah!” Viktor called back, and they went over to join their siblings.

Their journeys both had a long way to go, but for tonight, they could just play games with their siblings, and enjoy being a young person, or someone in the body of a young person.

And so the Umbrella Academy enjoyed their birthday. The Hargreeves family were together, and nothing stood in the way of their lives anymore. Luther, Diego, Allison, Klaus, Five, Ben, and Viktor. Whatever else would happen, nothing would separate the siblings anymore.