ZERO! the umbrella academy

seize

A DREAM

HERE IT IS, THE worst day of my life.

The day that everything changed. For better or for worse, I'll never know.

The shrill ring of the bell in Grace's hand echoed throughout the house, signaling for us to enter the dining room. We clambered down the long, winding staircase and dashed into the dining room as fast as possible. Five and I were the last ones to stand behind our chairs, waiting for Reginald's arrival.

"The Dülfersitz rappel is the preferred method for descent when rope is the only available tool," the monotone voice on the record droned on in the background. Reginald made his entrance, and we all stood at attention. He stopped behind the chair at the head of the table, his cold, dull eyes scanning over all of us.

"Sit!" he barked, and we all did as told, as if we were trained dogs. We picked up our silverware and dug into the meal that was laid out in front of us.

One and Three shot each other sly glances they thought no one else noticed across the table. Two carved random doodles into the arm of his chair, and Four rolled a blunt underneath the table. Six held a book in his hand about Anton Chekhov and read it as he ate. Seven kept her head down and silently chewed her food, not daring to make eye contact with any of us.

Five looked around at all of them, his eyes burning with anger and his jaw clenched. He was extremely aggravated today, even more so than normal. "Five, are you okay?" I whispered so the question was only audible to him.

He ignored me, and everything reached a boiling point when he picked up his steak knife and stabbed it into the carved mahogany of the table. Everyone's heads snapped to look at him, and my eyes widened.

Reginald swallowed a mouthful of wine.
"Number Five?"

"I have a question," Five immediately responded, anticipating his words.

"Knowledge is an admirable goal, but you know the rules. No talking during mealtimes," he chastised him as he cut into his food. "You are interrupting Herr Carlson."

"I want to time travel," he said anyway.

"No," Reginald automatically answered.

"But I'm ready. I've been practicing my spatial jumps, just like you said." He stood up from his chair and vanished in a burst of blue sparks before reappearing next to Reginald. "See?"

The beating of my heart sped up. I had warned Five against time travel before, but for some reason, he couldn't let the subject go.

"A spatial jump is trivial when compared with the unknowns of time travel." Reginald lifted his wine glass. "One is like sliding along the ice, the other is akin to descending blindly into the depths of freezing water and reappearing as an acorn."