Chapter Text
Disclaimer: I don’t own anything from Escape the Night, Our Eternity Together, or The Umbrella Academy. I just own any and all characters that I just happen create.
PROLOGUE: TRUTH AND CONSEQUENCES
*****
When it comes to speaking the truth, it can come with consequences, but whether those consequences are good or bad, that can depend on what truths are being told, and why those truths are being told, along with who is learning the truth.
But what do you do when someone refuses to tell the truth about something that could affect the fate of the world? And what kind of consequences would that person face for not telling the truth at the time?
Both Darius Hawkins and Reginald Hargreeves have been keeping secrets from their children, and the time is coming when they will have to face the consequences of keeping these secrets, especially the secrets being kept from Mystic, Delta, Cyrille, Andrea, and Vanya.
And when they learn the truth, it’s likely that these consequences will have a serious impact on the world itself.
*****
June 8th, 1993.
Darius stood in his study, listening to most of the children playing outside as part of celebrating their developing powers, unaware that something had just happened with two of their sisters, and he was going to make sure that they never found out.
He’d been reluctant to let Flora take Mystic and Delta to the park, given that they hadn’t, at that time, revealed their abilities like the rest of their siblings, and yet she insisted that since it was a nice day, that they should spend some time away from their siblings.
Darius had reluctantly agreed, but he also had Lennox followed them just to be sure that they would be safe, and he was glad that he’d made that choice.
*****
Flora walks over to a nice spot under a tree with little Mystic and Delta, and they giggle and chase each other as she unfolds and sets down a picnic blanket and the picnic basket next to it. She smiles at the two girls and call them over.
“Mystic, Delta, come and sit so you can eat.”
Still giggling, Mystic and Delta run over to sit with Flora, who gives them both their favorite sandwiches, and they happily eat them, enjoying them as they get to be outside without their siblings for once in their life.
Flora and the girls enjoy the picnic food, the fresh air, and the sunlight with the blue sky and puffy white clouds. She pulls out two bags that have a special food for the ducks, and she is about to give the bags to the girls so that they could feed the ducks-
-when a cluster of dark figures burst out of the forest and charge at them!
Flora gasps while Mystic and Delta both scream with fear, and that is when Lennox leaps out of a nearby tree, where he morphs into panther mode. With a snarl, he attacks the attackers, while Flora tries to get Mystic and Delta away, only to have more dark figures, some of them have on owl masks, come from the other direction.
One of them hits Flora in the head and she slumps to the ground with a dazed expression, and when two of the attackers grab Mystic and Delta, something unexpected happens.
Mystic screams, knocking away some of the attackers, and she shouts. “Once upon a time! A giant rises out of the trees and takes out the bad guys!”
There is a loud rumbling noise and soon enough, a giant did rise out of the trees, and it began smashing the attackers into pancakes.
Delta screams, starts to glow white, and she freezes all of the attackers, almost freezing Lennox in the process. And it isn’t long before all of the attackers are either dead, frozen, or have fled.
Delta and Mystic are still in panic mode when Lennox shifts to human form and sedates them, and then helps Flora up.
They know that they need to get the girls back to the house before anyone tries to figure out what they are doing, and after they make sure that the giant is gone, they gather up the girls, and they leave the park far behind.
*****
Darius turned to the desk and he updated the entry he put in the book earlier.
June 8th, 1993.
The children have started to exhibit powers, something that I suspected would be happening soon, and I am going to record and monitor their powers to see what they will be. I shouldn't have let Flora take Mystic and Delta to the park, they were almost taken by minions of the Cursed God and The Ancient Council. Only the presence of Lennox kept this from happening, that and I now know why Mystic and Delta are so special: Mystic has both the mythical Siren Song and the power bring to life whatever she imagines, and Delta has ice powers. If the Cursed God was to get his hands on Mystic, he would be able to use her to rewrite reality itself, and if The Ancient Council was to get Delta, they would use her powers to plunge the known universe into an endless winter. I cannot let this happen.
He sighed and shut the book, pondering how he can keep Mystic and Delta from suffering from the trauma that they experienced, and how he could do it without Flora stopping him. And that was when he got an idea.
*****
“No! I won’t let you do this to the girls!”
“Flora, please this is the best for-” Darius began, gesturing to the machine that he’d built that was connected to two glass cases that did resemble coffins, and had several soft blankets and pillows to make them as comfortable as possible.
“No it isn’t!” Flora screamed, standing between him and the stretchers that Delta and Mystic were lying on, asleep thank to the sedative that they had taken with the belief that they had been taking vitamin pills. “I won’t let you lock Mystic and Delta in those coffins! This isn’t the way to deal with trauma, you can’t just wipe it away!”
Darius stepped toward Flora with a pleading expression. “Please, Flora, my love, this is for the best,” he tried to explain. “They will be sleeping and have pleasant dreams. It’ll only be for two months, and both the trauma and the bad memories will be wiped away from their minds. Think about it…no more emotional and mental trauma, no more bad dreams about the incident.”
At first, it looked like Flora was going to cave – but she snatched up one of the hammers and used it to smash the coffins and the equipment before she was stopped by Maki and Lennox, and yet, the machine and coffins were ruined.
“There, now you won’t do anything to them,” she growled, “and to be extra sure, I will take all of the children with me. I won’t let you hurt them.”
Darius stared at the ruined machines and coffins, and he sighed. “Fine.” He then picked up two syringes and injected the sleeping girls. “There… Mystic will have no memory of the incident, and Delta will only have a vague memory.”
Flora wasn’t happy, but it was better then what he had intended to do, and she made sure to take the girls back to their rooms before they woke up in the lab.
*****
Meanwhile over at the Umbrella Academy, Reginald was standing in his study, staring out the window, and he was pondering what he was going to do with Number Seven, who Grace was calling Vanya. He’d been trying to train her to control her power, which was based on sound, and until yesterday, he thought he’d been making progress with her.
Reginald had been using glasses of water and a tuning fork to help her focus her power, and he thought that it was working…until yesterday when she made the glasses shatter, resulting in him getting a cut on his face and his monocle cracked.
‘Her power is too strong,’ he thought, turning to his desk and picked up the book that he wrote his notes in, ‘and I fear that it can’t be controlled. I must isolate her and come up with a means to stop her from using her power.’
He had no other choice, this was what was needed to be done to protect Number Seven from hurting herself and those around her.
*****
“Master Reginald, I have never questioned you about your methods,” Pogo said the next day after Vanya had been placed in a special vault, started giving her the pills to suppress her emotions, and Allison had used her rumor ability to tell Vanya that she was just ordinary, “but this is going too far! Vanya is just a child!”
“Number seven’s powers are too dangerous, Pogo,” Reginald reminded him. “This is the only way to keep her under control.”
Pogo shook his head angrily. “No, this is wrong,” he protested. “She needs love and support, not isolation, not believing that she’s not special, and not telling the other children to exclude her.”
Reginald fixed him with a stern look. “Pogo, I know what I am doing, and this is the right way to do it. Now I need to get to my work. You may go.” He sat down and worked on his book, and Pogo, after a few minutes, sighed and left.
The damage had been done.