Dolores POV

'Hmmm. Poke her.'

'No, Luther, we aren't poking her.'

'Just an idea.'

'Is she dead?'

'I don't think so, Klaus.'

'She looks pretty dead to me.'

'She's just knocked out still.', Five explained. 'Procedure's never been done before, so I'm frankly amazed she's even breathing still.'

We all stood around, looking at Lila's limp body, hooked up with a myriad of wires and probes and monitors. She'd been laying here a few days; we had taken advantage of her injury and dragged her home with us, tied her down, and Five started working. He wouldn't let any of us in the room until now, not even me.

'I'm eliminating our problem.', he'd said. No details given, not a smidge. I examined her body. She didn't look hurt. She looked perfectly healthy. None of us understood what he had meant.

Diego stared down at her face, arms crossed, looking absolutely pissed. He hadn't talked to any of us much in the past couple days, still seemingly reeling from figuring out she was still alive. And, you know, that he had a son, apparently. Guess she hadn't been bluffing after all. Oops.

I placed a hand on her wrist, feeling her pulse. Strong. I looked up at Five in confusion.

'When do we get to know what you did, exactly?', I questioned slowly, running my hand along her skin.

He put his hands on his hips, staring down at her. 'As soon as she wakes up, and I can know I did it right. That's when.'

'Did you sterilize her or something?', asked Kai, who stood with Roman and Quinn. Joan was in the library, unconcerned, as she had taken up genealogy as a hobby and it kept her occupied None of us had been able to rip her away from it since Annie disappeared.

'No, Kai.', Five answered quickly, taking a sip from his mug of coffee, as always. He shrugged. 'Not a bad idea, though.'

Diego scoffed. Didn't have to wonder what he was thinking.

Five clicked on his computer, looking intently at something, pressing every button it seemed like.

'Here. I'm going to wake her up now.', he said, biting his lip with a focused look.

Right before he clicked a button, Klaus snuck up behind him, taking a peek.

'What if she blows up?', he said in Five's ear, causing him to jump, spilling his mug of coffee all over the keyboard of the laptop.

'Klaus!'

'Sorry!', Klaus cringed, pulling himself back from the situation. The computer sputtered and sparked, and Five threw it off his lap hastily.

'Great.', Five huffed under his breath, watching as the connected wires on Lila's forehead sparked up as well. 'Everybody just get back.'

We all stepped back as he worked to fix the situation. Ripping the wires off her head, she instantly took in a deep breath, sitting straight up on the table like a bullet. We all stood staring at her in silence as she looked around at us, unsure what to do.

'Well, you've all gotten uglier.', she said, staring around. She met eyes with Diego.

'Says the one who's supposed to be dead.', he spat.

'Says the one who dumped his unborn child into the ocean in a body bag.', she retorted.

'Hey!' Diego launched at her, and Quinn and Luther jumped in front of him, holding him back.

'Calm yourself, Diego.', she said, unsticking wires from her chest. 'Seriously.' Diego fumed, lips quivering. 'Let it go, hun.'

'Let it go?', Diego said, pushing Luther and Quinn of of him. 'You want me to frickin' let it go?'

Lila raised her eyebrows. We all stood awkwardly. Seemed like they were gonna' hash things out right here and now.

'I've had a son for seventeen years and I haven't had a clue.', he scoffed. 'Yeah. Just let that crap go, right?'

Lila rolled her eyes, and breathed out heavily. 'Oh, calm down.', she breathed out. 'You'll meet him soon enough.' She looked around, stopping when her gaze landed on Klaus. 'After all, he's his new son-in-law.'

Klaus put his hands to his chest and gasped, heartfelt. 'I have a son-in-law?'

I was putting two and two together in my head. And when I did, I turned to Roman, who had just finished the addition himself.

'Wait a dang minute...', he said, running a hand through the front of his hair. His face twisted back and forth from utter confusion to building frustration, and Lila watched as everyone was grasping some surface-level understanding of what she'd told us.

'It was a beautiful wedding, really.', Lila said, smiling. 'Herb officiated, I witnessed. And Annie had a wonderful stroll down the aisle handcuffed to a wheelchair.'

'WHOA!', Roman shouted, launching at Lila like Diego had moments before. Except nobody stopped Roman.

Lila was unfazed. As Roman swung at her, she opened her mouth to speak.

'I heard a rumor that you stopped acting like an idiot.', she said nonchalantly, and there was no effect. Roman's swing hit her square in the jaw, and she groaned in pain, looking up at all of us in utter confusion.

'Wha-'

'How's it feel, Lila?', Five asked, smirking, sipping his coffee. 'Being powerless?'

What?

Lila thought for a moment, and then sucked her tongue as she shook her head at him. 'You little brat!'

'Wait, what?', Diego questioned, almost looking pleased with the situation.

'I removed her powers.', Five said, proud of himself.

Oh. Ohhhhhhhh.

Lila smirked sarcastically, and then gave him a murderous stare.

'Oh my gosh, how?', Klaus said, flabbergasted.

'Science-y stuff you all wouldn't understand.', he said, continuing his smile.

'Is it permanent, you little bastard?', Lila questioned, trying her best to not have an absolute meltdown, from the looks of it.

'Yup.', Five nodded. Diego's face lit up as he walked over to Five, high-fiving his free hand.

'Is that even possible?', Luther questioned, still confused.

'Obviously, dad.', Quinn inserted. 'Girl just got popped in the mouth 'cause of a failed defense.'

The room fell under an awkward silence as we all stood there, not knowing quite what to say or do.

Lila got up off the table, ripping off the last of the wires stuck to her.

'Well, if you're done torturing me, I guess you won't need me here anymore.', she said, finger combing her hair.

'Nope.', Five said, and he pressed a button on a remote in his hand, causing Lila to seize and fall to the ground as a shrieking buzzing noise rang out.

'What was THAT?', she groaned, grasping at her neck.

'Internal remote-controlled shock collar.', Five explained, once again looking extremely pleased with himself.

All of our eyes widened as we were all suddenly a little more terrified of my husband than we usually were. Kai had to stifle a laugh, covering his hand with his mouth, and Quinn elbowed him in the ribs, then had to hold in in herself.

'Perfect.', Lila breathed out, still laying on the floor.

'You're not going anywhere.', Five said, and we all collectively stared down at our once formidable foe, now conquered captive.

Joan POV

I stared down at my computer, at least ten different browser tabs open, history books laid out on the table in front of me.

'Tudor lineages and family trees', a site read in the search results, and I clicked on it. It loaded up, and there he was, at the top of the page.

King Henry VIII. Red hair, piercing black eyes, that infamous stare. My dad. The dad that I felt guilty to even consider my father.

And next to him, two women, one brown haired queen, and another with bright red curls, just like my own. Both had the same stare.

My two sisters. Queen Mary I, and Queen Elizabeth I. My biological, 500-years-dead sisters. I stared at them in awe. Something within me ached. I closed my eyes, hanging my head, and I shut the laptop closed.

I grabbed my phone from my pocket. I had to get my mind off this. I had to stop thinking about them. It was an insult to the family I had. It felt wrong. But it was so, so very intriguing.

I scrolled through my social medias mindlessly for a minute, until a messages notification popped up at the top of my screen. An unknown number.

'How do these scammers even get my number?', I whispered under my breath as I opened the message.

But this one wasn't the usual offer of a new wonder-alternative to Viagra, or hot women in my area that wanted to meet up with me. This was an actual message, written by an actual person, it seemed like. I read through it.

'Hey. Texting from a friend's phone. Lost mine, haven't had it for a long time. I'm safe. I can't tell you where I am, but I'm safe. Don't come looking for me. I've got it handled. Tell the fam. -Mojo'

Mojo.

That's code. Annie. This was Annie texting.

I jumped up from my seat, shoved the chair back under the desk, and let my feet fly out of the room and down the stairs as my heart raced.

She was alive, she was okay. I couldn't help but smile as I ran. Roman was going to be so happy. And Uncle Klaus, oh, he would happy cry for sure.

I reached the bottom of the stairs, running into the den, seeing them all now sitting on the couches having a drink, with Lila laying in the floor in between them.

I raised my phone and shouted, and they all looked at me immediately.

'What is it, hun?', mom asked, sitting next to dad, who had his arm wrapped around her.

'It's Annie.', I said, trying to catch my breath, blinking a tear out of my eye. 'Annie texted.'

And my uncle Klaus, who had grown fond of liquor once more lately, turned a 180 in a split second, letting his glass of scotch fall to the ground as he threw his hands up in shock and screamed louder than I'd ever heard before.