"Vivian?"
My head swung up from my pillow to find Allison, a shocked smile on her face, standing in the doorway to my bedroom.
"Surprise! I'm not dead." I joked, sliding out of my blanket and off the bed to stand.
She brushed past the door and practically tackled me in a hug, almost sending me falling back onto the bed. I smiled, and hugged her back. We hadn't properly hugged in years, and it was good to be connected with her for a bit, even if it took something dramatic as my death to do it.
"Vivian Rose Hargreeves, don't you dare die on me again."
"No promises." She shook her head, a smile on her face as we pulled apart.
"You are impossible."
"Yeah, I try to be. Sorry I didn't let you know I was, uh, not dead earlier. I lost my phone, and I wanted to go to sleep as soon as possible last night."
"It's alright, Viv. I'm just glad you aren't gone."
"Me too." She let out a small laugh as I grabbed a hair tie and pulled my hair back into a ponytail, already bothered by the small wisps of brown drifting across my vision.
"Did... Did Pogo tell you why you didn't remember your powers?" She looked guilty, and I was pretty sure that even if Pogo hadn't informed me the day before that I would have been able to figure out what she had done.
"Yeah. Obviously I'm not thrilled about it, but I'm not mad at you or anything. It was Dad who ordered it to happen. I forgive you."
"Really?" I smiled a little, nodding. I wouldn't blame my sister for my father's stupid decisions, I knew her better than to think she would willingly use her powers against me.
"You wouldn't have done it if you had a choice, Alli."
She pulled me into a second hug, resting her head on top of mine. She let out a sigh that seemed loaded with regret, but when she pulled back she was concerned about something other than her past actions.
"Luther's calling a family meeting. Apparently the apocalypse is coming in three days."
"That soon? Man, I never even got to go to a proper bar. How tragic." I joked, hoping the apocalypse wasn't actually going to happen in less than a week. He was most likely exaggerating.
At least I hoped he was.
"I'd grab some breakfast first, we'll probably be there for a while." I nodded, turning to my bedside table. "Viv?" I looked back to her, expecting something sentimental. "No drinks, alright? You just died, so give your liver a break for once." She sent me a pointed look, then left my bedroom.
"Well apparently I can heal myself, so there's no need to protect my liver," I muttered to an empty room.
~~~
After changing out of my pajamas and eating a piece of toast, I headed upstairs and settled down behind Klaus, who had settled himself in front of one of the loveseats, a cup of coffee in hand. He patted my knee as Allison began to speak.
"Three days?"
"That's what Five said," Luther confirmed, accepting the coffee our sister offered him.
"But can we trust him? I don't know if you've noticed, but Five's a little-" She whistled, twirling a finger around beside her head.
"Our little psycho," Klaus laughed, taking a long drink of coffee.
"Five's not- well, I'm not gonna tell you his sanity is all there, but I believe him," I spoke up. I tried to make it a habit to trust my siblings, which, while it had gotten me into sticky situations many a time, had turned out to be a pretty okay rule to live by. I'd only died because of it once, at least that I knew of.
"He seemed pretty convincing. If he wasn't trying to stop an apocalypse from happening, those two lunatics wouldn't be chasing him." Luther got my full attention with that comment.
"That's why they were after him?" Diego asked, his curiosity peaked as well. Made sense, considering what they had done to our family.
"Yeah." Luther nodded.
"What did Five even see?" Allison asked. The four of us looked to Luther for an answer, but he hesitated for a moment.
He was definitely hiding something.
"Uh... Apparently, we all fought together against whoever was responsible." We sat in silence for a moment, waiting for him to continue and tell us what the outcome of the fight was, but when he stood and spoke up again, it wasn't what we wanted to hear. "Okay, so, here's the plan. We go through Dad's research-" We cut him off before he could finish.
"Wait, what?"
"Hold on, hold on."
"Whoa, hold up."
"Wait a tick, wait a tick, wait a tick." Luther turned as Klaus waved his hand for our brother to stop talking. "What actually happened the first time around?"
"Yeah. What're you not telling us?" Diego asked.
Luther glanced between us, looking nervous.
"Luther, what happened?" I encouraged him, a sinking feeling in my stomach.
"Come on big boy, spit it out."
Luther looked down at his coffee cup, and muttered something I couldn't make out before taking a swig of coffee.
"What was that?" Allison asked, and he coughed.
"I said, uh, we died."
I laughed a little, not quite processing what he had said. After a moment, I met Diego's gaze, seeing shock in his eyes that I knew was reflected in my own. Luther walked over to the bar, setting his coffee cup down, and Diego stood and followed him. The latter was in a rage.
"Wait, just now you're telling us this?"
"Look, it's not important, we-"
"The fact that we're going to die in three days isn't important? Christ, Luther, you're hopeless," I sighed, getting up and walking around the bar.
"We'll do better this time." Luther tried to walk away from the bar, but Diego grabbed his arm to stop him.
"No, we need to figure this out." I poured myself a glass of scotch as everyone interrogated Luther, and downed it in one gulp, embracing the burning sensation in the back of my throat. I figured Allison would be fine with my liver being screwed up if I was gonna die in three days anyway.
"Vivian?"
Conversation stopped as I looked up to find Vanya standing beside a man who seemed almost impressed by the sight of us.
"Hey." I ditched the glass and walked out from behind the bar to greet my sister.
"You're- I saw you, you were- how?" She accepted my hug, and I noticed she smelled strongly of wood. Weird.
"Turns out I have healing powers," I whispered in her ear, not trusting the stranger standing nearby.
"What- um, okay." A confused small smile made its way to her face, and I grinned back.
"She's more resilient than we gave her credit for, Van-Van," Klaus said, grabbing the glass I was using and pouring himself a drink.
"Hey!" I returned to the bar, and stole the glass from his hand before he could take a sip of it. He glared at me as Vanya asked us a question.
"What's going on?"
"It's a family matter," Allison told her, and I sighed before gulping down the scotch in my hand.
"A family matter? So you couldn't bother to include me," Vanya had a sad smile on her face, and I let my head fall and rest on my hands as Luther tried to make amends.
"No, it's not like that. We were-"
"Please, don't let me interrupt." She walked towards the door, and I sighed again as Klaus rubbed his temples.
"Vanya, wait!" Allison protested. "I'll fill you in later when we're alone."
Vanya shook her head, and turned to face us.
"Please, please don't bother. And I won't either."
"Vanya that's not fair." I agreed with Allison, we didn't have her cell number and she wouldn't listen to us now that we were here. We hadn't meant to leave her out.
"Fair?" She has disbelief in her tone as she glared at Allison. "There's nothing fair about being your sister. I have been left out of everything for as long as I can remember. And I used to think it was Dad's fault but now he's dead. So it turns out you're the assholes."
I groaned as she stalked out of the room, standing and letting my forehead fall on Diego's shoulder, who patted the top of my head as Klaus exclaimed, "Ouch."
"I'm gonna go find Vanya and explain," Allison said, determined as she walked towards the entrance of the house.
"No, wait, there isn't time. We need to figure out what causes the apocalypse," Luther protested.
"She's our sister, Luther. She deserves to know what's happening, powers or not," I picked my head up and stared at him, daring him to disagree.
"We can tell her what's going on after we make sure she, and everyone else on this planet, aren't gonna die." I looked down to the glass I was holding. He was right. "Now, there are loads of possibilities. Nuclear war, asteroids. But I'm thinking this is about the Moon. Right? Dad must have sent me up there for a reason. And I was giving him daily updates on the conditions, sending him field samples. So the first thing we need to do is find his research."
"Hold on, hold the phone." Klaus tapped the bar twice, then waved his hand around, continuing. "We all died fighting this thing the first time around. Remember?"
"Klaus, shockingly, has a point. What gives us a win this time?" Diego asked, gesturing with a knife, as per usual.
"Five. Last time we didn't have him. We weren't all together." Klaus gagged, picking himself off of the barstool and sitting on the couch. I sent him a worried glance as Luther continued. "This time we'll have the full force of the Umbrella Academy. That's what we need."
"So, where's Five now?" Allison asked.
As Luther said something about changing the timeline, I moved over to sit beside Klaus on the couch.
"You okay, broseph?"
"Nope. My body doesn't like sobriety."
I grimaced, and patted him on the back, which didn't seem to help.
"I'm going after Hazel and Cha-Cha." Diego announced, drawing my focus to the man wearing all black as he picked up his coat.
"Right now?"
"Hell yeah. Three days and I'm losing light by the minute."
"Look, Diego," Luther scoffed, "Look, I know you wanna avenge your friend, but we've got a bigger problem here."
"She wasn't just some friend, Luther. And let me remind you that they murdered Vivian too, after they tortured her and Klaus. So if I'm gonna die, I need to know that I killed those bastards first."
"I'm in." I stood, joining Diego as he walked towards the atrium.
"Vivian-" I turned and looked at my brother, who had despair in his eyes- "Please stay. We need your help."
"Look, I'll come back here tonight. If you've found something then, I'll help. But right now, I'm gonna go get revenge for myself and the dozens of others that Hazel and Cha-Cha have killed." I spun and followed Diego out of the room, leaving Luther behind.