Ten Minutes Ago

16. The Silenced Rumor

Guinevere waited for Five to wake up and he eventually opened his eyes. When she noticed he was awake, she asked, "Good morning. How do you feel?"

"Not great, but I think I'll live."

She smiled. "That's certainly a start."

Liam and Layla appeared in the doorway and noticed Five awake. The two cried in sync, "Uncle Five! You're okay!" They ran up and hugged him, causing him to groan.

Guinevere pulled her twins back. "I am so sorry."

"It's all right," Five replied, noticing her expression. "What's wrong?"

"There are two days left until the apocalypse, and I'm concerned we won't be able to stop it."

He met her eyes. "We will, Gwen. I know we will."

"But what if we can't? I mean, I -- I should be d-" She cut herself off, realizing she probably shouldn't finish her sentence in front of her twins.

Five nodded slowly. "You would have been had Diego not come when he did."

Their attention was drawn to Klaus yelling loud enough to hear upstairs, "Whoo! He popped his cherry!"

Guinevere grimaced. "Well, that's certainly not something you hear every day."

After a moment, the two of them walked down the stairs, followed by the twins.

When they entered the kitchen, Klaus was pouring coffee and Luther was sitting at the table with his hood up. Guinevere noticed a cup in front of an empty chair and figured it had to be for Ben. Diego occasionally had spoken of his brother who'd tragically passed.

Guinevere grabbed a bottle of juice from the fridge and poured both Liam and Layla a cup.

In sync, the twins said, "Thank you, Mommy."

Guinevere smiled. "You're welcome, loves."

Five stole Luther's cup of coffee and immediately frowned. "Jesus. Who do I gotta kill for a decent cup of coffee?"

Guinevere let out a sigh. "What I wouldn't give for a good cup of coffee."

Luther sighed as he leaned across the table. "Can we get started?"

Klaus frowned. "Anyone seen the others? Diego? Allison? No?"

Guinevere leaned back in her chair. "I saw them yesterday. They joined me and Five when we went to Harold Jenkins' home. He's got an unhealthy obsession with the Umbrella Academy and an even stranger obsession with Vanya."

He frowned at his sister-in-law's words, seemingly disturbed. "All right, then, this is the closest thing to a quorum-" he banged the table, "-that we're gonna get. There's no easy way to say this, so I'm just gonna spit it out."

"This is a bad idea."

"Yeah."

Klaus got distracted, and Luther called his name again. "Klaus."

He looked down as he said, "I conjured Dad last night."

"Conjured?" the twins repeated, confused.

Luther frowned. "I thought you said you hadn't been able to conjure anybody in years."

"Ah, yes, I know, but I'm completely sober," Klaus replied. "Ta-da! I got clean yesterday, to talk to someone special, and then ended up having this conversation with dear old daddy himself."

"What does conjured mean?" Layla demanded.

Guinevere glanced at her daughter. "Conjure means to call upon someone to appear. Next time we ask in a nice tone, all right?"