17 years ago...
"Nietzhe once said, 'Man is a rope stretched between the animal and the superhuman. A rope over an abyss. It is a dangerous crossing, a dangerous looking-back, a dangerous trembling, and halting.' As much as you must strive for individual greatness, and strive you must, for it won't come to you of its own accord...you must also remember that there is no individual stronger than the collective."
"The ties that bind you together make you stronger than you are alone. They will make you impervious to the pain and hardship the world will thrust upon you. And believe me when I tell you, life will be hard. It will be painful. We can accomplish anything when we accept responsibility together. This is what creates trust."
"Together, you will stand against the reign of evil." Their father told them from above.
"I'm going to win." Diego stated proudly as he looked up at the stairs.
Luther, Allison, Klaus, Five, Ben, and Zero glared at the boy in front of them. "Yeah, okay, keep dreaming, knife boy." Zero responded with a roll of his eyes.
"If anyone is going to win, it's going to be me." Five said with a smirk.
"Good luck with that guy's." Diego said, chuckling.
"Come on, guys, I'm going to be the winner today." Klaus cut in.
"No, you're not. I am." Allison responded, which made Luther chuckle; Allison turned to him and glared. "What's so funny?"
"Oh nothing, just that you guys think that you can beat me when I'm the one who is obviously going to win." The boy said.
"You guys are idiots, who's the one that can jump through space? Oh yeah, me." Five told them matter-of-factly.
"Yeah, yeah but that doesn't mean I can't trip you on the way." Zero retorted.
"I just want to get this over with." Ben muttered out while the group began to argue on who was going to win. Zero smiled at his brother before ruffling his hair and offering him a smile which the boy returned before pushing Zero's hand away and recombing his hair.
"Attention!" Hargreeves yelled, making the kids freeze before looking up at their father. Hargreeves gave them all a small nod before looking over at Vanya. She looked down at the group below her, bringing the whistle in her hand up to her mouth.
The children's eyes widened before quickly positioning themselves in front of the stairs. Vanya took a deep breath and blew into the whistle; the group immediately began making their way up the stairs.
They had made it up one flight of stairs when Luther and Diego started to shove each other for the lead. Zero continued to run a smirk on his face as he realized something, phasing through the wall the boy continued to run until phasing back to the stairwell now ahead of Luther and Diego who continued to shove each other.
When Five realized that he wasn't going to be in the front at this pace, he frowned and quickly space jumped to the front of the group. Seeing this made Zero pushed himself harder not wanting to lose against the arrogant boy.
"That's not fair! Five and Zero are cheating!" Diego yelled when he realized what they had done, but Hargreeves only waved him off.
"They adapted." He told the boy. Five managed to reach the top first with Zero as a close second, then Diego, Luther, Klaus, Allison, and Ben.
Five smirked at the others, "Told you I would win."
"Shut up," Zero said, shoving Five playfully. Five's eyes flickered over to him, smiling and holding his fist in the air; the boys quickly fist-bumped.
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The following day Hargreeves announced to the children that he had a special surprise for them and to get dressed in their uniforms and head downstairs. Naturally, this made them all suspicious because their father never surprised them with anything fun. The word didn't even seem to be in the old man's vocabulary.
"What do you think the surprise is?" Ben asked curiously.
"Maybe a day off!" Klaus exclaimed hopefully, swinging his arm around Ben's shoulder.
"I doubt that," Allison said as she moved a strand of hair out of her face, placing it back in its place.
"How do you know?" Klaus asked, wanting to believe that their father would do something nice for them for once. But even he knew it would take more than a miracle for the man to do anything enjoyable.
"Because Father would never let us just relax," Zero responded, adjusting his tie. "And why would he start now?"
"Let's just go." Luther ordered.
Zero glared in the boy's direction; he never liked how Luther acted as if he was the leader just because his name was Number One, and he often didn't follow his orders unless it was actually something clever. But at this moment, Zero knew it would be best to just follow along instead of causing an argument that would lead to punishment. So zero nodded along with his other siblings in agreement before following behind him down the stairs.
The group's footsteps stopped suddenly and paused at the bottom. "I don't think we're getting a day off." Diego whispered to his siblings, watching as a tattoo artist set up his station in the middle of the room.
Within minutes, the group was lined up and seated to get their tattoos of an umbrella on their wrist. Klaus and Allison were in the corner crying after getting their tattoos, providing comfort to each other, while Diego sat in the chair as the tattoo artist put the gun to his wrist, attempting to hold back whimpers of pain.
Luther, Ben, Five, and Zero sat in chairs with the same look of fear on their faces.
Trying to find anything to distract himself, Zero's eyes met Vanya's as she watched what was happening to them from her hiding spot atop the stairs. Vanya offered the blonde a small smile, but Zero only shook his head with a frown causing Vanya's small smile to disappear completely.
"Number Zero." Hargreeves spoke sternly, causing the boy to look away from his hidden sister and towards the man while he gestured towards the now empty chair that Diego had sat in moments ago.
Taking a deep breath Zero stood from his chair and made his way to the other. He was petrified as he made his way to the chair, his movements rigid each step longer than the last until finally he made it and took a seat.
It felt like an eternity to Zero as he waited for the tattoo artist to finish cleaning the equipment he had used on Diego and changing the needles on his tattoo gun. The boy gulped as the man put the tattoo gun on his wrist before yelping in surprise as the man started to tattoo his wrist. Zero looked down at his wrist while gritting her teeth as his other hand curled into a fist.
Zero hated his father for forcing this onto them; he hated how the man never seemed to care about what they wanted or what they needed. They never asked to be born or to be adopted by him, and no way in hell had they asked to be the world's protectors.
They were mere children, and he had made them go through so much pain and trauma already.
YOU ARE READING
Number Zero- The Umbrella Academy (Book 1)
Fanfiction"On the twelfth hour of the first day of October nineteen eighty-nine, forty-three women around the world gave birth. This was unusual only in the fact that none of these women had been pregnant when the day first began. Sir Reginald Hargreeves, e...
