"I would not have pegged Don Luther for an Irish bar man" Theodore mused quietly to himself as he remained waiting in the car for his dons to come back out. Chomping heartily on a piece of jerky, from the packet he'd found in the glovebox, Theodore pulled his hood lower over his face still in an effort to avoid being recognised by the half-sloshed patrons of the bar and anyone who was passing by.
It had been Don Klaus who had mentioned this particular bar as a place that Don Luther might flee to, stating that his apish don had more or less shaken out the location from his brother earlier that morning and Don Klaus, having seen what kind of hardcore party scene that New York held, had directed him towards something a little safer. Because he would be damned if he was fighting off jealous boyfriends and clinging furries in the middle of a rave. Again.
"A German bar or a rave, maybe. But not an Irish bar; it just—it seems too…classy for the likes of him" Not that Theodore was a good judge of character for things like that, but from what he had seen on TV and the like, Don Luther just didn't seem like the sit down and drink a few pints kind of a guy. He seemed more like a party 'til you drop or no drop at all, kind of a guy. Which, according to what Don Klaus had said, was likely to be more truthful than Theodore was expecting.
"—YOU SHOULD'VE JUST LED WITH THAT!" Don Luther's voice bellowed out of the pub (Theodore's 'spell' had seemingly ended, granting the large man his voice back) catching Theodore's attention as the front door was snatched from its hinges with immense force. "JESUS CHRIST!"
"C'me on! Let's go!" Don Klaus cheered as Don Diego shooed them out of the pub before the owner could catch wind of their sudden dine & dash and the property of which they had unintentionally damaged. The others weren't far behind.
"Crap!" Don Diego cursed as he tried to sort of settle the door back onto his hinges before they left.
"Leave the door" Don Fën commanded as he was the last to slip out of the door and into the car before peeling out of the parking lot and out towards the outskirts of the city. "We gotta go"
Despite Don Luther's sudden enthusiasm in finding his sister-slash-love-interest, the hours-long drive to Jackpine Road and the Jenkins' cabin was spent in relatively terse silence as Don Fën drove and Don Luther periodically asked said driver to speed up. The cadillac—despite being a wonderful piece of machinery—was not built for that kind of speed or weight, and so, the journey took a little longer that it probably would have, were there less passengers in the car.
Of course with Don Fën at the wheel, that meant that the front seat had been pulled as far forwards as it could go so that he could comfortably reach the pedals. In turn, that meant that Don Klaus, who was sat in the passenger's seat—had his legs propped up against the dashboard whilst Theodore had tucked his own underneath himself. Settled between his two dons, his head lolled to the side, resting against Don Klaus' shoulder as he stared listlessly through the dashboard window and let his mind go blank.
"…Hey" Don Luther leant forward, over the seats dividing them as he appeared at Theodore's shoulder for the umpteenth time since they had passed through the barricade (Theodore had had to get out and hike through the woods a little before he rejoined up with his family a little further down the road). "Are we there yet? Does any of this look familiar to you?"
"Like I told you before" Theodore rolled his eyes at the annoying persistence as they trundled through Jackpine Cove. "I. Don't. Know"
"How can you not know?!" Don Luther demanded, growing irritated at the short answers that went nowhere.
"I don't know because the last time I was here, I was seven years old and bleeding from the face" Theodore snapped back as he contorted just enough to stare his tallest don in the eye; his tone full of derisive venom. "So you'll have to excuse me if my memory isn't up to par!"
"Damn!" Don Klaus muffled his smirk in his hands as he suckled on the piece of jerky that he'd nicked from Theodore at some point during their drive. In the backseat, Don Diego seemed to agree as he turned his smirk to the window.
"…Can you go any faster?" Don Luther then turned to Don Fën as Theodore slumped back against his seat with a huff.
"Ask me again and I'll burn you with the cigarette lighter" Don Fën replied conversationally as Don Luther slumped back in his seat with a pout. Nonetheless, Don Fën pressed on the gas and silently adhered to his brother's request to speed up. It wasn't much, but it was something.
Night had fallen by the time the Hargreeves boys had arrived at their destination, the cabin looking far more imposing in the dark setting that it had any right to. Scrambling from the vehicle before it had even come to a full stop next to Allison's idle car, the elder Hargreeves all hurried to investigate the place and ultimately find their wayward sister(s). Theodore, on the other hand, was not so quick to flee from the car as he moved at a much more sedate pace and turned off the ignition, before making his way up the worn porch steps. Unlike their home in Queens, Theodore remembered this place and although there were some good memories here, most of them were overshadowed by the bad ones.
BANG!
Theodore jumped at the sound of the door banging up against the cabin wall as Don Luther slammed it open and raced inside, intent on finding Ven Allison like a bloodhound on a scent. "…You all right there, Teddy Bear?" Don Klaus asked, sidling up next to his neef who remained stuck in the doorway as if crossing the threshold would wrought some kind of immeasurable punishment or pain upon him.
"Uh, y-yeah" Theodore swallowed thickly as he toed at the threshold, eyes roving over the space that he could see. "It's just—it's a lot smaller than I remember"
"Well, you were smaller then" Don Diego replied helpfully as he passed, going to search the kitchen for any sign of their sister.
It was clear to anyone with a brain that Theodore didn't want to be there, but they had more important things to worry about at the moment. In the back of the house, the sound of slamming doors and panicked cries of her name, told them that Don Luther was still searching fervently for the lost woman. Inwardly, Theodore wondered darkly where this level of enthusiasm had been when his vera had gone missing four days ago.
"Where is she?!" Don Luther demanded as he thundered back into the living room of the cabin, his large frame just barely squeezing through the narrow doorways. "Where's Allison?!"
"How're we supposed to know, you idiot?" Don Diego sassed, hands on hips.
"Theodore" Don Fën turned to his neef still stood in the doorway.
"Hm?" Theodore hummed, thankful that his attention was diverted from the crooked picture frame which covered up the fist-sized hole in the wall.
"Are there any other places where she might be?"
"Um…" Theodore blinked, trying to think of somewhere Ven Allison might be. Aside from the cabin, there was the woodpile beneath the porch, the shed over by the gulley (the one that trickled down to the lake) where—much like the attic—they had been forbidden to go, a whole array of forestry and the lake to sort through.
"Anywhere at all?"
"Er…"
"Hey! Where is she!" Don Luther demanded as he stomped over to the boy, making him flinch and scuttle back a few steps. At least until Number One was prevented from going any further.
"Hey, Teddy" Don Diego piped up this time, much gentler than Don Luther as he clung to brother's arm in an effort to keep him back. "Remember the attic in Queens? Were there any places out here that you weren't allowed to go?"
"Uh, there's—there's the shed out the back" Theodore replied, pointing over his shoulder to the building out in the dark. "It's out by the gulley"
"Show us"
Leading the way back out of the cabin and over to the shed, Theodore made sure to keep to the path with lumen-lit eyes and flickering torchlights lighting the way. Eventually, they came upon the rickety building at the back of the property just as he said it would be and much like the cabin, Theodore felt a strange sense of foreboding (more than just the constant echoes of his Doro telling him not to go down there) and he knew at once that he did not like that place. Don Luther, on the other hand, held no such qualms as he busted down the old door and moved to search the interior of the small shed.
Whilst his dons busied themselves with rummaging through the shed and its surroundings, Theodore felt himself drawn to the gulley despite its foreboding presence. It was like staring into the void or the urge to walk out in front of traffic despite the knowledge that it would hurt. A lot. 'L'appel du Vide' he thought it was called. Pretty words for something so dark; but a lot of things in life were like that: pretty to hide the dark.
"…Could she be down there, d'you think?" Don Klaus came up beside him and peered over the edge of the dark gulley.
"Lore…!" Theodore swore under his breath, jumping at his sudden appearance as he tried not to go over the edge himself.
"You can barely see anything in all this darkness!" Don Fën soon joined them at the edge, "How're we supposed to find someone down there?"
"Teddy?" Don Diego came up behind him, placing a reassuring hand on his shoulder. "Can we get a hand?"
"U-um, o-okay" Theodore nodded shakily as he edged closer to the cliffside.
Sucking in a deep breath, Theodore squared his shoulders and cleared his mind as best he could. Using his superb hearing, the tween made sure to keep his ears pricked as he exhaled; letting out the scream into the gulley below. Don Diego had often compared this scream to that of a banshee or a wailing babe, but either way everyone around him quickly slapped their hands over their ears, least they suddenly find themselves without their hearing or worse.
AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!
Theodore found himself to be thankful of his years in the choir which helped him to extend his breath as he continued to screech down into the void so that the loud sound waves coming out of his mouth could bounce off of every crook & crevice in the gulley below, creating a map in the boy's mind of what lay down there. An outcropping of rocks, a gnarled tree stump and a particularly humanoid log lay directly below them. To the left there was the slowly trickling water that ran down in the lake and a collection of (what he hoped were) animal bones piled high. To the right there was a fallen tree or two, a once slumbering goat who had been scared by the sudden screech and a nest of some sort hidden in the heather. All of this and more rebounded back off of the sharp edges of the gulley as Theodore found himself being used as an impromptu sonar detector.
"…Ow" Don Luther deadpanned as Theodore's scream eventually drew to a close.
"NICE SET OF LUNGS, YOU'VE GOT THERE…" Don Klaus shouted, seemingly unaware that he was doing so "DOES ANYBODY ELSE HEAR RINGING?"
"Klaus, you're shouting" Don Fën helpfully nudged him, more or less telling him to tone it down or shut up.
"Well?" Don Diego turned to the Human Garde with hope tinging at his tone as he pulled his hands from his ears. Unlike his siblings, he had been watching the boy and had noted the moment when Theodore seemed to have found something promising because he seemed to be especially fond of a certain area.
"Down there" Theodore pointed to where he had detected the humanoid log. "Straight down, third outcropping from the left"
"Right" Don Fën nodded as he quickly—blindly—Blinked down into the gulley to retrieve whatever had been located down in the dark.
WHOOSH!
They didn't have to wait long until Don Fën returned with Ven Allison in tow. Although when they did return, it was not a sight that Theodore had been expecting and the sight alone, stopped him cold. The world seemed to grow numb as Theodore stared wide-eyed and dumbly down at the glassy-eyed figure of his once lively ven. Wailing cries filled the forest and the scent of blood clogged at his senses as he stared down at his ven who had been bleeding profusely from the neck, but now she just gurgled like the bubbling waters below.
Theodore had always known that his parents could be rather violent when they wanted to be, and that his Doro had a sordid past he may not have entirely let go of. But he had never expected to find something like…this. Was THIS why Doro had forbidden them from coming here? Were there MORE people down there? It made him sick to think about it.
"Allison! No! Allison!" Don Luther's choked sobs echoed throughout the woods as he dragged out of Don Fën's tenuous grip and into his own one; cradling her close as he sobbed like a babe. "Stay with me! Please!"
That's…that's Vera's scarf. Theodore blinked dumbly at the navy and white scarf clenched tightly in his ven's hand. She was here! Vera was here! Ven MUST'VE seen her! Must've talked to her! How else could she have it? Oh bless you, Lore! Vera's alive! (…For now)
In the meantime, Don Klaus stood at Don Luther's shoulder and alternated between glancing around the garden as if he was trying to find her ghost, and down at the bleeding woman in his brother's arms. Both Don Diego and Don Fën stood nearby, each of them wearing expressions of blatant disbelief and shock at the state of their sister. And despite having brought her back to them, Don Fën appeared to be fighting back tears as he stared down at her limp figure; reminded of his gruesome discoveries in the apocalypse, no doubt.
…BA~BOOM …BA~BOOM …BA~BOOM …BA~BOOM…
Confusion pulled at Theodore's brow as he tilted his head in puzzlement at the faint sound that reached his ears over Don Luther's wails and the same one that pierced through the mind-numbing fog that blanketed his brain. It almost sounded like…a heartbeat. But it couldn't be…! But it was. It was weak and faint, but undeniably there.
"…Ven?" Theodore murmured, tilting his head the other way as he tried to figure out if the heartbeat he was hearing was hers and not some nearby critter. It was an action that Don Fën misunderstood for grief as he placed a comforting hand on the boy's shoulder, not that he minded much. "Uh…Don Luther? You—you might not wanna squeeze any harder…"
"What? Why?" Don Fën asked, his voice thick with emotion as Don Luther spared a teary-eyed glance up at his neef; one that silently implored him to explain himself or suffer the consequences for interrupting his mourning.
"Can't—can't you hear that?" A beat of silence followed his question as the elder Hargreeves tried in vain to hear what Theodore could. "I think—it sounds like—it's a heartbeat"
"What? Are you sure?" Don Klaus perked up, sounding hopeful that another one of his siblings would not be joining the ghoulish ranks that haunted him so.
"Ven—" Theodore quietly padded over to Ven Allison's head where it lolled about in Don Luther's grip, "Ven, blink if you can hear me"
Everyone seemed to hold their breath as Ven Allison took the world's slowest blink. The slow and languid—but undeniable blink—caused a fresh round of wails to emanate from his apish don as relieved breaths were hissed out from between clenched teeth and shoulders slumped back down towards the ground as a weight was lifted off of them. At least, for now. To be honest, it was a miracle that she had lasted this long and there was no doubt in his mind that she likely wouldn't have lasted much longer had she been left alone.
"We should go" Theodore turned towards Don Fën and Don Diego, silently pleading for their help to remove the woman from Don Luther's grasp so that they could still save her in time.
"Five" Don Diego turned to his brother, cogs a-turning behind the eyes. "Can you take her back to the academy? Y'know, Blink her back with you?"
"Not that far. Not like this" Don Fën shook his head sorrowfully. He could only take passengers with him a short distance without issue and considering her current state; well, any number of things could go wrong.
"Lu—Luther! Let go! We can't help her if you don't let go!" Don Klaus cried as he tried to yank his sister out of their brother's tight grip. Eventually Luther relinquished his hold on the woman, but only after some internal warring and a low gurgle from Ven Allison that persuaded him to do so.
"Fine. Teddy, come here" Don Diego instructed as he untangled the scarf from Ven Allison's grip and used it as a makeshift bandage around her throat.
"Don?" Theodore greeted, shuffling over to his don who was bent over his sister.
Cupping Theodore's nape, Don Diego dragged him down to eye level, making sure that the boy knew he meant business. "Take her to the academy. Get Mom & Pogo to help. Got it?"
"Buh—!" Theodore spluttered, "The hospital—!"
"Theodore!" Don Diego never called him Theodore. That was only for when he was in trouble; so he knew that this was serious.
"R-right! The Umbrella Academy! Got it!" Theodore nodded shakily as he suddenly found himself with an armful of Ven Allison.
Theodore dug his feet into the grass, twisted the balls of his feet once or twice to get a good grip before taking a run-up as he looped his arms under her pits to pull her into a shoulder drag. Closing his eyes, he let the song of his heartbeat fill his ears and heaving a deep breath as the white noise of his stronger Legacy bubbled to the surface. The soft glow of loralite enveloped him whole and just as it blanketed his own body, it in turn, cocooned Ven Allison in a similar state which made it easier for him to lift her (and reassured him should she happen to slip).
One step, two, three and then—! The next few moments passed by quickly as the air whistled through his curls as he leapt high into the air with Ven Allison dangling beneath him. And before he knew it, the pair of them were flying back towards the city and back towards the academy in search of medical help. Theodore only hoped that they wouldn't be spotted or followed by unwanted eyes.
"So…" Klaus blinked dumbfoundedly as he watched his nephew fly off into the moonlight. "He can do that. Did we know that he could do that?"
"Mmhm" Diego hummed in acknowledgement as he started up the cadillac whilst Five & Luther drove Allison's car back to the academy.
"I didn't know that we knew, he could do that"
"Klaus! Get in the car!"