"𝐺𝑜 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑖𝑓 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑚𝑢𝑠𝑡, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑟𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑚𝑏𝑒𝑟, 𝑛𝑜 𝑚𝑎𝑡𝑡𝑒𝑟 ℎ𝑜𝑤 𝑓𝑜𝑜𝑙𝑖𝑠ℎ 𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑑𝑒𝑒𝑑𝑠, 𝑡ℎ𝑜𝑠𝑒 𝑤ℎ𝑜 𝑙𝑜𝑣𝑒 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑤𝑖𝑙𝑙 𝑙𝑜𝑣𝑒 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑙."
― 𝑆𝑜𝑝ℎ𝑜𝑐𝑙𝑒𝑠, 𝐴𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑔𝑜𝑛𝑒

𝒩.

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐅𝐈𝐑𝐒𝐓 𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐆 that hit Natalia when she awoke was the pain in her jaw. She groaned softly, bringing her hand up to softly touch it and wincing at the immediate pain. She was sure it didn't look pretty, either.

"You feelin' okay?" murmured Diego, who was holding her bridal-style.

"I'm fine," she said. As painful as it felt in the moment, she had definitely experienced much worse this past week—compared to all that, this was simply a scrape on the knee. "You can put me down."

He glanced down at her, his frown prominent. "But—"

"It's my jaw, not my legs."

Reluctantly—because he felt like some kind of hero, she was sure—he let her on her feet. She walked into Diego's room and sat down on the edge of his bed, her fingers still lightly grazing her jaw.

It was then that she remembered the whole reason why Luther had knocked her out: Vanya. She was still locked in the basement.

Natalia immediately got to her feet. She hurried back toward the door, though she was promptly stopped when Diego grabbed her waist.

"Whoa, slow down there, cowgirl."

Natalia tried to pry Diego's hands off of her, but his grip was too strong. "Let me go, Diego."

"Where?"

"You know where!"

"Why," he scoffed, now slowly dragging her back toward the bed, "so Luther can choke you to death this time?"

She shook her head, though her attempts to break free were weakening. "I can deal with him."

"Oh, yeah, that's why I had to carry you up here."

She shrugged. "He caught me off-guard, that's all."

"Vanya's fine." He gently pushed her back to sit on the bed. The stern look on his face told her that there was no way of getting out of there, so she gave up and laid back.

"You guys are the worst brothers ever."

He gave her a pitying look as he took her hand. "I don't think that's ever been a big concern."

She stared at him, her eyebrows furrowed. "Wow."

"Listen," he sighed, tightening her grip on her hand, "why don't we just go get some food and get home?"

"Go home?" She scoffed. "I don't think so."

"Stayin' here isn't gonna be helpful, either."

She sat up and pulled her hand away from his. "You can go home. I'm staying."

He shook his head. "Well, I'm not leaving without you."

"Guess we're both staying here."

"Nat, I don't get why you're so upset over this. Well," he added hastily upon seeing her eyebrows quickly furrow, "I get it, but I don't know what you wanna do. There's no way Luther'll let her out, and, besides, she's here, not at some insane asylum or somethin'!"

"He locked her up!" she exclaimed. "Like she's some criminal!"

"But if she has powers—"

"Even if she did, how is that a bad thing? The rest of us have powers!"

He shook his head as she got to her feet, wringing his hands. "There must be a reason why Dad wanted to hide it!"

"Oh, yeah, so the best way to figure that out is by caging her like an animal!"

"Why are you mad at me?" He sighed. "Be mad at Luther!"

"Because you're agreeing with him! You—"

Her words were cut off by a loud boom. She stumbled back as the ground shook and grabbed onto the desk for support.

Diego was up and holding onto her in under thirty seconds. "You okay?"

Her head tilted up as the sound of explosions continued. It was definitely coming from within the house—but what was even going on?

"We gotta get downstairs," Diego muttered as soon as she had reassured him that she was okay. "Figure out what's happening."

She followed him down to the ground floor, where they met Klaus, Pogo, and Luther in one of the corridors.

"Yo," exclaimed Diego, "what the hell is going on?"

Klaus bumbled forward as the ground trembled once more. "Are those explosions coming f—"

"Vanya," confirmed Pogo, clearly distressed. "We need to get to safety outside the Academy."

Natalia looked toward the walls as creaking and eruptions continued to sound. Pogo was right—if they didn't get out soon, their bodies would be buried under wood and concrete.

As she followed Diego toward the stairs, Klaus hot on her trail, Luther called out, "Don't forget Mom!"

"Nat," said Diego as they reached the staircase, a little out of breath, "go."

"What?" she questioned, her eyebrows knitting together. "What about Grace?"

"I'll get her. You get the hell out of here."

She scoffed. "You're crazy if you think I'll leave you here."

"Nat—"

"We get it, you two love each other," interjected Klaus, ushering them toward the stairs, "just go up!"

Diego groaned, and Natalia knew he knew there was no way out of this. The three of them dashed up the stairs. At this point, dust was falling from the floor above them, and cracks were building up in all the stone pillars.

She kept her arms ready to protect her ducked head as they made it to Grace's charging station—but to their dismay, the chair was empty.

"Where is she?" questioned Diego, coming to a stop.

"Mom!" yelled Klaus.

They ran to the other side of the floor, though they weren't able to make it much farther when the ceiling started to collapse. Klaus was knocked to the ground when the first piece of the ceiling struck him. Natalia was just about to grab him when something struck the back of her head, and she was met with the cold floor.

Next thing she knew, she was a meter away, and the rest of the ceiling was where she just was. She groaned, her hand immediately straying to the back of her head as she used the other to push herself up. Diego was beside her in the same position, and she could only assume they had all fallen victim to the falling debris.

The following five minutes were controlled by pure adrenaline. There wasn't a single thought going through her head except to get the fuck out of there. Never had she feared for her and her family's life as much as at this moment; even considering all the life-threatening missions they'd been on, nothing had been as terrifying as this.

She had no clue where anyone else was—especially Vanya—but at this point, all she could do was pray they'd get out safely. And with the shattering windows and unstable ground, everyone would need to be out within a few minutes.

A cool breeze hit them as soon as they were out of the house. It smelled of dust and rotted food, but she couldn't love the air more.

"You okay?" asked Klaus worriedly to the two of them. "You okay?"

"Hey," exclaimed Diego as he cupped Klaus' cheeks, his voice hoarse, "you just saved our lives, man."

"Okay," he mumbled, "great."

As much as Natalia wanted to hug and exclaim her thanks as well, she couldn't pull her eyes away from the crumbling Academy. Her home. It was half its size and quickly disintegrating without hesitation. The grey dust clouds made it difficult to see through the windows, but movement at one of the lower ones caught her eye.

"Holy shit," she breathed out. "Grace."

The name seemed to have drawn Diego's attention. "Mom! Get out of there! Mom!"

"Mom, get out of there!" yelled Klaus at the same time. "Mom!"

"I'm comin' after you!"

There was no way in hell that Natalia would let Diego back into the collapsing home. She quickly grabbed onto him just as he made a break for it and pulled him back.

She and Klaus held him back, refusing his pleas. As much as it broke her heart to let Grace die, she wasn't going to risk losing someone else.

In a mere twenty minutes, all that was left of the prestigious Academy was mounds of rubble.

A few fires were ablaze, though none of them were spreading. Their old possessions—toys, furniture, books—were among the smashed concrete, now torn and broken.

Every breath that Natalia let out was a sigh. She sat down on one of the larger rocks to keep her spinning head from worsening.

Diego was a few feet away from her, searching through the debris for Grace. When he called for her to help him look, she couldn't do anything except look at him with pity. As much as she wished it to be untrue, there was absolutely no chance that Grace had survived.

She didn't want to give Diego that truth—though he most definitely knew it, deep down—and instead lowered her head.

How had it gotten to this point?

At the beginning of this week, they were mourning their father. And now, they had to mourn Grace and the Academy.

She wanted to cry, but the dust had dried out her eyes, and so she was only left with sniffling and shaking shoulders. She only half-heard Diego's plea for her and Klaus to help him, and that only sank her heart further into her stomach.

Her head picked up as Klaus began to pull the knelt Diego up. She watched—she could only do that: watch—as Diego begged Klaus to let him continue digging, though the other man did nothing but refuse.

"She's gone," Klaus said softly, steadying Diego. "She's . . . She's gone, okay? She's . . ."

"What do you wanna do?" desperately replied Diego, his lower lip quivering. "You wanna—wanna . . . w-w-walk away from this?"

"No."

"What about Pogo?"

"He didn't make it," came Luther's voice, and Natalia looked to the side to see him and Allison approaching.

A sigh of relief left Natalia's lips for the life of the two, but then his words caught up to her. "What?"

Luther sighed. "Vanya killed him."

Natalia's look of disbelief was mirrored on Diego's face as he uttered, "But Vanya wouldn't—"

"No, I saw it," Luther interjected, stopping before them. "Just before we got out."

"Mom," Diego murmured, sitting beside Natalia. "Now Pogo."

Natalia let out a heavy sigh and lay her head on Diego's shoulder. So much had happened in the span of half an hour. Too much. She wasn't sure how much more she could take.

And then, of course, the scrawny boy who always bore bad news climbed his way over.

"Guys! This is it—the apocalypse is still on. The world ends today."

Natalia shut her eyes. Of course.

"I thought you said it was over," Luther pointed out.

"I was wrong, okay?" Five said, waving the newspaper in his hand. "This newspaper, I found it in the future the day I got stuck. The headline hasn't changed."

"No, that doesn't mean anything." Diego shook his head furiously. "The time could've been altered since that newspaper came out this morning."

"You're not listening to me—when I found it, I assumed this place came down along with everything else. But here we are. The Earth is in one piece, but not the Academy."

Klaus grabbed the newspaper and took a few steps away as he rifled through it. "I'm confused."

"Then listen to me, you idiot! Vanya destroys the Academy before the apocalypse." Five sighed. "I thought Harold Jenkins was the cause, but he was the fuse; Vanya is the bomb. Vanya causes the apocalypse."

"We have to find her," Luther realized.

The whirring of helicopter blades and the wail of sirens made them look up. Of course, the disintegration of an entire building wasn't going to go unnoticed.

As a bright light shone down on them, Natalia stood. "We have to go, now."

"Regroup at the Super Star," Luther called out. "Go!"