EUNOIA ━ diego hargreeves

30

CHAPTER THIRTY

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FREYA COULDN'T exactly believe what she was seeing. She'd known Ben to be dead, he had been for a long time, he hadn't even been in the academy when she first met Klaus. It was alarming, in a way, to see him standing before them all. The others were just as starstruck as she was, and who could blame them?

"Ben," Klaus whispered, awed. Freya shared a look with Diego behind his back, and Luther took a cautious step closer. Clearly, something wasn't right. And Diego seemed to be the only person who was sharing her train of thought.

"Is that really you?" Luther asked.

"And who," Diego demanded in a shout. Both Freya and Klaus winced at his tone. "Are the weirdos on the balcony?!"

"They are the Sparrows," Reginald stated simply. "My children."

Silence fell. Freya shifted awkwardly on her feet as the Hargreeves shared brief looks from around her. Five spoke first. "I'm sorry. What do you mean, your children? That's not possible, old man."

"Of course it is!" Reginald insisted, and the Sparrows joined Ben in the living room, standing in a line. "I think I'd know, wouldn't I?"

"Everybody else can see Ben, right?" Klaus wondered, still dazed.

"Cute hat, sundance," Ben commented lazily. Klaus tipped it in his hands, as if he were flattered.

"They call themselves the Umbrella Academy," Reginald explained. "A group of scheming, perfidious malcontents who accosted me in the fall of 1963 when I was away on business in Dallas. Be warned, they claim to be my spawn."

"Leave me out of this one," Freya said. "I never claimed shit, half-court hairline."

She caught Diego smirking from the corner of her eye, but one of the Sparrows neared closer, threateningly. "Watch how you speak to our father."

"Or what? Is box troll over there going to challenge me to a game of four square?"

"You little-"

"Be quiet."

Freya rolled her eyes as Allison turned to Five and begged for an explanation. He shook his head. "I don't know anything yet, but it's concerning."

"Is he telling the truth?" Another Sparrow spoke.

"Not the part about us being perfidious," Vanya said.

"We're amateur-fidious at best," Klaus interrupted.

"But we are his children," Vanya went on. "Majority of us, anyway. This is our house."

"Yeah, yeah," Luther nodded. "We, uh... We grew up here."

"Yeah, yeah, we grew up here," a Sparrow mocked, and they all laughed. Freya narrowed her gaze.

"Only we get to make fun of Luther," she said darkly. "So shut your face before I make it worse than it already is."

"Freya!" Allison hissed, then she raised her voice. "Look, none of you belong here."

"Oh, well then!" Someone with short hair and glasses mused. "I guess we'll just pack our bags and move out."

There was a weird, robotic sound that came from the floating box that was next to the Sparrows. Freya blinked away her confusion. The Sparrows all chuckled.

"You slay me, Chris," Ben said.

"Oh, great," Freya muttered. "Box troll has a name. And he's one of them. These people just get weirder and weirder."