Let it Rain (The Umbrella Academy)

CHAPTER NINE: Heart Attack

Five and I sat at the barstools with only the buzzing of an overhead light and the rumbling of the coffee pot to break up the silence.

"I don't remember this place being such a shithole," Five commented, breaking the air.

I gave him a fleeting glance almost startled. "Do you remember when we used to come here as kids? Eat donuts 'til we puked. Good times."

"Simpler times, huh?"

"Much." I breathed out a quiet laugh. "So, when did you get back?"

"Yesterday."

"Why eight days? Not an even week like me?" I chuckled. He shrugged. "Dae you happen to have an idea of how to stop this?"

Five pulled out a folded cloth and opened it to reveal a glass eyeball. "This is all I got. It was in Luther's hand when I first arrived in 2019." The doorbell dinged as an older man walked in.

"You could ask him for an address of where it might've come from." I nodded my head in the man's direction.

"Yeah, good thinking." He turned away and asked him while I sipped my drink.

He swiveled back to his coffee. "You said that your consciousness was fifty-eight. Whit was your life like?"

He thought about it for a moment. "I tried to follow you to wherever you ended up but I messed up and wound up stuck in the apocalypse aftermath for forty-five years. Did what I had to to survive. Then I joined the Commission for a few months until I figured out the equations for a way back."

"2019? Tha' must've been absolute h-e-double hockey stick." I finally looked him in the eyes. "A'm sorry for lashing out about Delores. A'm glad you had her, really."

"She holds a special place in my heart, but she wasn't you." I flashed a smile and there was another long silence. "What about you? What was your life like?"

"Ah time traveled accidentally. Who knew you can't spatial jump continents?" I chuckled. Five raised an eyebrow. "I ended up sometime after the 2019 apocalypse, walked around the rubble for a bit, then time traveled to the past but went too far. Ah was then in 1955 and was able to use your power once more but Ah only got to 1963 where the Handler offered tae put off a nuclear war tae end everything."

"How were you able to time travel so many times? I got stuck after the first."

"A lotta coffee Ah guess." I shrugged.

"What about the Commission?"

"Um, at the Commission Ah met Lila and Gill. Lila 'n Ah are more like sisters noo than friends, really. And Gill is... well, Gill is Gill. One of my best friends." I chuckled. "Stayed there for almost seventeen years." I took a sip of my coffee then laughed. "Apparently in another timeline Ah got stuck in '55 and spent eight years as a "kick ass hitwoman" as the Handler put it."

He smiled. "Kickass hitwoman?" I put on an innocent face as my smile spread.

I looked down at the bell's reflection. "Do you see that?" I whispered and picked up a butter knife. People in black combat uniforms walked into the diner and with guns at the ready.

"That was fast. I thought we'd have more time before they found us," Five muttered to me.

"Lookie here. We've got Number Five too," one of the gunmen muttered under their breath. Five scoffed.

"Okay," the leader started. "So let's all be professional about this, yeah? On your feet and come with us. They want to talk."

"Funny, 'cause I don't," I replied.