12

A Mother's Love

Allison didn't care what anyone thought as she ran out of the court booth. She picked up Five and laid him across her knees.

"Anyone? Please help!" She shouted at the rumbling voices around her. No-one came or responded, the rumbling continued around the courtroom. Allison found herself clutching Five to her chest as she stared at his open wounds.

"Who did this to you?" She whispered. Her mind then remembered what he had said. Claire. Her precious daughter had been kidnapped.

Her mind began to race, where had Claire gone? Who had taken her? Five was the only who knew and right now he was at risk of bleeding out. Allison looked up, frantically searching for anyone that might help. Everybody was in a state of frenzy, voices raising and there were even people beginning to leave the courtroom.

She felt a hand on her shoulder and realised Sai was behind her clutching a first aid box. Relief flooded through her veins but only for a few seconds before she realised the current situation she was in.

Sai said nothing, only knelt down next to her and opened the box. She opened one of the antiseptics and began to clean away the blood from Five's many wounds with exact precision and delicacy as if she had done this many times before.

"Who is he Allison?" Sai whispered as she began to clean a particularly gruesome wound on his abdomen. Allison could make out his shrapnel wound, it still wasn't healed but it hadn't opened up again. However there was bruising and swelling beginning to form around it.

Allison didn't answer for a moment, could she tell her lawyer about Five? No-one really knew that Five Hargreeves had returned, they hadn't really made a song and dance about it since returning to 2019.

"He's my brother." She finally admitted and grabbed some bandage out of the box so that they could dress a few of Five's wounds.

"Your brother? I thought all your brothers were the same age as you?" Sai said with a frown.

Sai knew about the Umbrella Academy and what their Father had done. She had to, to take on Allison's case. When Five had gone missing, it had been on the tv and in newspaper headlines for months on end but as the years had dragged on, his disappearance had become a footnote. An unsolved cold case, until he had returned.

"We used to be the same age." Allison replied as she finished dressing some of his wounds. Her fingers briefly touched a few of his bruises. If he was awake, she knew he would be writhing in pain.

"He's Number Five? I thought that he was dead." Sai said as she finished with the rest of Five's wounds. It was a poor job but it was better than nothing.

"So did we." Allison whispered as she shifted Five back into her lap. She wanted to let him rest but she needed to know where Claire was.

She knew her powers would work, she had used them on her sleeping siblings after all. She had used them when her father required them to wake up for night-time training. She wondered if her brothers held any resentment for those training nights. They had started just after Five had left. It was their punishment for his leaving.

"I heard a rumour you woke up." She whispered. Sai heard her but didn't say anything.

Five's eyes fluttered open and he let out a heavy whine.

"Allison?" He said looking up at her through the corner of his eye.

Allison squeezed his hand and he winced.

"Claire," He croaked out. "She was taken by Ripley."

"Ripley?"

"My old partner." Five said so quietly, she hardly heard it.

Alison froze for a moment. That strange man who had been at the restaurant? The one who had made Five cry?

"You remembered who he is?" Allison said with a frown.

Five managed to prop himself up with his arm but was still in Allison's lap.

"Yes." That was the only response he gave. His breathing had started to become laboured and he looked pale.

"Where did he take her?" Allison's heart began to beat faster and faster.

"Back to the umbrella academy." Five answered.

"It looks like you two have to go get Claire." Sai said, glancing around the courtroom.

"But what about the court case and the authorities, surely they can help?" Allison blubbered.

"Forget about the case, what's important is your daughter. You can use my car. It's in the parking lot below the courtroom. I'll distract everybody." Sai said with a wink.

Allison felt like hugging Sai. She didn't because Five was still in her lap, she could still hear his terrible breathing. He needed to go to a hospital. If only their Mom was still alive, she would have been able to fix him up within a heartbeat.

Sai gave her another wink before walking to the middle of the room, the chaos had seemed to lessened but there was still a hint of panic throughout the people that remained. All of their eyes were on Allison and Five. Allison couldn't see Patrick anywhere.

"Five, I'm sorry to do this to you but do you think you might be able to do one more jump?" Allison hated the way her voice sounded. Pleading to her hurt brother because she was scared for her child, for her only daughter. That her own brother's pain was at the corner of her mind.

"Probably." Five said with his eyes closed.

A pair of car keys came skidding along the ground and Allison looked up at the direction of where they had come from. Sai.

"It's a white porsche. The only one." She mouthed to Allison.

Allison nodded. When all of this over, and if she wasn't dead she would have to pay Sai back in ways she couldn't even fathom.

Allison watched out of the corner of her as Sai shouted. She didn't hear the rest as Five jumped, taking her with him.

They landed in the parking lot with a large thud. Allison looked down to see Five's head loll to the side and his body became slack. She picked up the car keys and pressed a button on the car keys, they beeped and came from one of the cars in the middle of the parking lot.

Allison picked Five up in both of her arms, right now she was glad he wasn't too heavy. As she approached the car she bent down to open the passenger door, she slotted Five into the seat and secured his seatbelt. She had to make sure that it was in a secure position so that it wouldn't choke him. When she was finally happy, she got into the driver's side and put the car into reverse and drove out of the parking lot.

The streets of LA were busy with tourists taking photos, people walking their dogs, and people cycling through the lanes. Allison had missed the city that she had lived in for the past seven years of her life. She could imagine spending the day with Claire as they went to go clothes shopping trying on as many as her daughter could find. Or they could sit outside one of the prestige cafes and get two expensive iced coffees. She missed those days with a burning passion, and if she could get her daughter back then those days might come back.

She tried not to think of what would happen with the court case after, what that would mean for her, for her daughter. If Patrick had let Claire get kidnapped when she was with someone, what would that mean for him? Would her daughter be taken off to foster care because both her parents had failed her.

Allison shook her head and grabbed the steering wheel. That could wait for after she had Claire back in her arms. She changed lanes and started to head down towards the highway. It was going to be a long drive, all the way to the other side of the coast. Allison calculated it in her head it was going to take about two days or so to get to the other side. Two days where her daughter was in perilous danger. She would save her, she had to.

The day was getting warm as she drove onto the highway. She glanced towards Five, his breathing had become softer and no longer laboured. She was still worried but perhaps he wouldn't need the hospital. Perhaps he would be okay and he would be able to help her rescue Claire. She wanted to laugh, she really was thinking her injured brother would be healed in two days? The notion was absolutely ridiculous.

She carried on driving as the afternoon turned to evening and the sky began to grow in the sky. More than once, Allison found her eyes growing heavier and heavier as the night drew on. She was now in the middle of a dusty road. She really doubted that she was going to find a hotel all the way out here.

Allison tried to carry on but found her arms were getting heavy and her eyes were also drooping. She decided to pull along the side of the road and rest her eyes. She was slowly drifting off to sleep when Five's scream woke her up.

"Help!" He screamed.

Allison looked to see him scratching at his seatbelt. Reaching across she undid and he seemed to relax again before thrashing around. He was dreaming. Dreaming something terrible by the looks of it.

"Please that wasn't me! It was my other self!" He cried out.

Allison blinked as she listened. His other self? Did he mean the older version of him. For the first time, Allison realised that her second rumour might have done something. What though only Five knew. She obviously had screwed up again. A Hargreeves making a mistake, what else was new?

"Please!" Five screamed.

Allison had heard enough. She reached across and gently shook his arm, being careful not to touch any of his injuries. He thrashed around again but then his eyes opened slowly.

"Allison?" He asked, looking over to her.

Allison couldn't really make him out in the dim light but she nodded.

"You were screaming in your sleep." She said leaning back into her seat.

"Where are we?" Five asked looking out into the desert. Allison noted how he had disregarded what he had said but she decided to ignore it.

"I'm not sure, I've been driving and driving. I had to stop to get some sleep but Claire, she's in danger isn't she?" Allison doesn't glance at Five. She can't handle the expression that she knows he's wearing on his face.

Five didn't reply. Allison looked over to him and saw that he lifted up his ripped shirt.

"Who patched me up?"

"Me and my lawyer. She helped to get us out of here. I owe her a lot." Allison mumbled to herself.

"We will get her back Allison. I swear I will get her back." Five's voice is more grown up than it's' been ever since Allison rumoured him. Yup, her rumour did something.

"But what if we don't? I should carry on driving. She's my only daughter Five." Allison sighed.

"Claire only has one mother. I've only met her once but she seems strong." Once again Five's voice sounds like his older self.

"I know, I just want her back." Allison whispered.

Allison decided then that she would get some sleep, rest her head and the two of them would go home and they would take Claire back from that man. She would kiss her daughter's head for the first time in two years and she would rip the man Ripley in shreds. Nobody threatened her family, not her brothers and sister and especially not her daughter.

She was going to get her daughter back.