Wind Chimes || The Umbrella Academy

Chapter 21.

Edited

-

When Diego walked into the hotel room, his entire world stopped. Everything froze, yet was in fast motion at the same time. Eudora was laying on the ground with a bullet wound in her abdomen, a deficit of all emotion in her eyes. Diego was not only terrified by only this, but also the fact that when he glanced toward the closet to the right, he could see a mop of dark brown hair flowing over a shirt that he had last seen Serenity in.

At the moment, he didn't know what to do. Whether to check on who was sitting still in the closet, or if Eudora had a pulse. Since Eudora was closer, he reacted to her first.

"No, no, no, Eudora! No, no, no!" Diego cried, running to his ex who was not moving. He pleaded for her to wake up more, kneeling next to her body. Before he could stop himself because of fear, he looked up and saw exactly what he didn't want to see in the closet, what he suspected when he first glanced at it. Serenity's dead body, head facing downward and body slack. The smell coming from her decaying body was horrific, but he couldn't help but get up and walk to her, tears gathering in his eyes.

"Ren," Diego said weakly, moving the hair from in front of her face. Even though she had been dead for at least a full day, Diego saw her as nothing but how she looked when he last saw her. Skin glowing, smile wide, bright eyes.

"I can't leave you here," Diego said quietly, trying to untie her body from the restraints which prevented her from escaping when she was alive. So many emotions were running through Diego's head that they were hard to keep track of. Grief and anger were at equilibrium, and it was hard for him to deal with. A single tear ran down his face once he realized that he needed to leave.

Diego wanted nothing more but to carry Serenity back home and lay her in bed where she could just sleep and wake up in the morning. But he couldn't. Sirens from police cars rang outside of the hotel, forcing him to stand up fully.

"I need to go, okay? I am sorry. Both of you." Diego whimpered with more emotion in his voice than he probably ever had released. Before he left the room, he noticed a receipt laying on top of a donut box. He took it from the table and then was gone within seconds.

~

"When's it supposed to happen? This... apocalypse?" Luther asked five as they stared at each other from only a few feet away. Both of them were leaning forward, clearly in a dire situation.

"Well I can't give you the exact hour, but from what I could gather we have four days left." Five stated, knowing that it wouldn't sit well with Luther.

"Why didn't you say something sooner?" Luther asked Five, irritated that Five didn't trust him to help with the situation. It might have been that Luther didn't want Five to do it alone, but it was likely more about him wanting dominance within the family. Luther wanted to be the leader, and he couldn't be if Five was on this "mission" alone.

"It wouldn't have mattered." Five stated calmly.

"Of course it would. We could have banded together and tried to help you stop this thing." Luther argued with a harsh tone in his voice.

"For the record, you already tried." Five told Luther, equally as calm as before.

"What do you mean?" Luther questioned, confused as to what Five meant even though it was quite obvious.

"I found all of you. Your bodies." Five stated sadly, vividly remembering the exact position each of his siblings were in and the confusion he held when Serenity was not laying in the rubble with them.

"We die?" Luther asked, shocked by what he had just been told. Five nodded subtly, looking at his bother.

"Horribly. You were together trying to stop whoever it was that ends the world." Five said. He couldn't get the image of his sibling's corpses out of his head, no matter how hard he tried.