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Ten little soldier boys went out to dine
One choked his little self, and then there were Nine
Sir Reginald Hargreeves was dead.
The paper, the news broadcasters, the autopsy, they all claimed it had been his heart, giving out in the middle of the night. He was old, around for longer than any of them could remember, and time had simply caught up with him.
But of course, they were all wrong.
“Are you sure about this Master Reginald?” Pogo had asked, his eyes questioning behind his glasses. “Surely there must be another way.”
“There is not,” Hargreeves had assured him. “I’ve seen how this all turns out. This is the only way to bring them all back together, to save the world. It is what they have been working towards their entire lives. It is far too important to give up now.”
The chimp had given a resonating sigh but had agreed to his master's wishes.
Reginald took his tea, offering a toast to Pogo.
“Bottom’s up, old friend.”
He drained the cup in a single gulp, as if it were an ordinary cup of tea.
For a second, he looked normal. Then he began to choke, pounding his chest as his coughing grew more persistent.
He had only enough time to glance back up at Pogo before falling limp against the bed sheets, his death the first move in a game the children didn’t realize they were playing.
Nine little soldier boys stayed up very late
One overslept himself, and then there were Eight
I heard a rumor you asked me out.
I heard a rumor you wanted to be my agent.
I heard a rumor that you took me to dinner.
I heard a rumor that I got the part.
I heard a rumor you kissed me.
I heard a rumor you loved my audition.
I heard a rumor you loved me.
Allison forces a smile as the paparazzi scream for her attention, cameras flashing as bright lights shine in her face.
She used to love it, this feeling right here. Ever since her Umbrella Academy days, when reporters would fight each other to talk to her or one of her brothers, each always struggling to have the latest scoop on the world’s favorite heroes.
She remembered standing with Five and flipping her hair over her shoulder, the two competing for who could get the most attention.
I win, she thought bitterly, wondering for the thousandth time where he could be. Sometimes, on nights like this, she liked to imagine he was somewhere amongst the crowds, moving through the mob of people to come find her.
It was stupid really. It wasn’t like they’d ever really been that close, but for whatever reason, that was immediately where her mind always went on nights like this when the paparazzi become damn near overwhelming.
She didn’t understand why she was unhappy. She had the perfect job, the perfect husband, the perfect life. What was there to complain about?
Sure, she only had it because of her rumors. But what was she supposed to do? It wasn’t as if she was good enough to get any of those on her own.
She was just little Number Three, the Rumor, the girl. Her powers were everything, and without them, she was nothing.
Without them, she would never have gotten Patrick to fall in love with her, never had made it so big in Hollywood, never have been able to have Claire. Without them, she would never have mattered to her family, and would have been thrown away and discarded.
Useless.
Worthless.
Ordinary.
Nobody.
Nothing.
She waved at the paparazzi, blowing kisses into the crowd.
What would they think, if they knew?
What would the papers say if they knew how useless she really was? What would the tabloids spread if they knew about the rumors? What would the world whisper if they knew that Allison Hargreeves was nothing without her powers?
What would they say if they knew she was a fraud?
What would they say if they knew?
What if they knew?
What if, what if, what if?
She pushed the questions down, locking them away. There was no point in asking, because she would never know.
No one would.
I heard a rumor that you all believed me, no matter what.
She’d tried rumoring herself into believing as well, but she had always been the one person she could never fool.
Eight little soldier boys traveling in Devon
One said he’d stay there, and then there were Seven
The others had all left, one after another, falling like a line of dominos that had been set off when Five disappeared.
“Come with me,” Allison had asked, when it was just the two of them left.
“I can’t,” Luther had told her. “I have to stay here. With dad.”
“But then you’ll be alone,” she said. “Please, Luther. Come with me.”
“Why do you have to go?”
She sighed. “This has been my dream since I was a kid. And now that everyone’s gone, there’s nothing holding me back.”
I’m not gone, Luther had wanted to say. I’m still here.
But it wasn't enough.
She was gone the following week, leaving him there all by himself.
He hated her for leaving The Academy, for leaving dad, for leaving him. He hated all of them. Maybe one day they would all realize their mistakes and come running back, telling him he’d been right, and they were sorry for abandoning him.
Because he was right to stay here with dad. He knew he was. They were the wrong ones. He was in the right, not them.
But sometimes, on the days the house felt most empty, he couldn’t help but think that perhaps it was the other way around.
Seven little soldier boys chopping up sticks
One chopped himself in halves, and then there were Six
When Luther had spotted him, his first thought was that there was no way it was real. There was simply no way there could possibly be that much blood.
His second thought was that he was going to throw up everything he had eaten that day when he realized it was.
Splatters of crimson coated the walls, the floor slick with red. Chunks of torn flesh and ripped out guts sat among the dark puddles, making the scene all the more horrifying.
And lying in the middle of the floor, his torso shredded beyond recognition, was a young boy. No older than sixteen, his mouth was open in a silent scream, his eyes forever open in utter terror as tears and dried blood stained his cheeks. His dark hair was matted, dirty, and partially covered by an old gray hoodie.
Luther knew this boy.
Except he wasn’t just a boy, he was a hero.
A soldier.
A killer.
His brother.
The Horror.
Number Six.
Ben.
Sweet, thoughtful, sarcastic Ben, who never wanted to use his abilities to hurt anyone.
Torn apart by the very monsters that lived within him.
Had they planned it out, tired of being forced to hide away within him? Did they plan to finally escape by tearing through his brother’s body? Was it planned or was it spontaneous? Did they really want to escape that bad?
Most importantly, did they know they were going to kill him?
Ben certainly had.
Luther thought back to a conversation they’d had just the other day.
“What’s wrong?’ he’d asked, moving to sit down beside his brother. Ben stared blankly out the window, playing with his hands.
“They’re going to kill me one day,” Ben had told him, his voice barely a whisper. “The monsters. I can feel it.”
“You’re just paranoid,” Luther had said. “They’re not going to kill you.”
As he stared down at his brother’s face, blood splattered and empty of life, he couldn’t help but think how very, very wrong he had been.
Six little soldier boys playing with a hive
A bumblebee stung one, and then there were Five
The ghosts were screaming again.
They were always screaming, but it was louder today. So loud, in fact, that Klaus was seriously considering shoving an ice pick through his ear, if for nothing else than to deafen himself so that maybe they would quiet down for once in their afterlives.
His hands were over his ears, eyes squeezed shut so that he couldn’t see the ghost sitting in front of him, a young girl with blood running down her throat.
She kept reaching for him, a shiver running down his spine when her little fingers grazed his arm.
He flinched back, back hitting the brick wall of the building he was sitting in front of. He spent most nights on corners like this.
He used to go back to the Academy, creeping in before anyone noticed he was missing. It was only when he realized they didn’t notice that he slowly started staying out longer and longer, until he faded from the house, simply leaving one day and never looking back.
Beside him, Ben was speaking in a low voice, words urging him to get up and face the girl.
Klaus shook his head, twisting his face away from the girl and her touch and her sad, dead eyes.
His hand left his ear to dig around in his pocket, fingers frantic and anxious.
“Klaus don’t do this,” Ben begged. “You can beat this on your own. You don’t need the drugs.”
Klaus ignored him, pulling the syringe from his pocket.
He barely lets himself pull up his sleeve before he jams it in his arm, having grown used to the sting. Compared to everything else he dealt with, he barely noticed it anymore.
The girl still screamed, but it was growing, quieter, more faint.
He opened his eyes to see her turn dull, her edges blurry as she faded from view, lost to the world once more.
A sigh escaped his lips as the familiar feeling of euphoria crept into his mind, his brain becoming foggy as his muscles relaxed. His limbs felt suddenly light, as if he could take off and fly off to a different, better world. One without ghosts, dead or missing brothers, and torn families. One without asshole fathers and stupid powers.
Beside him, Ben grows quieter, his voice a distant buzz in the back of his mind.
The syringe falls from his hand as he slips into mindlessness, the ghosts having finally grown silent.
For now, anyway.
Five little soldier boys going in for Law
One got into Chancery, and then there were Four
Diego walked out of the academy on his eighteenth birthday and never once looked back.
He was done with all of it. Done with dad, done with his siblings, done with uniforms and interviews and shit.
He was tired of being part of a team. Tired of being forced to Luther’s stupid plans just because he was number one.
He wanted to do things his own way, without his brother or father’s voice in his ear. He wanted to be able to do things without the media being all up in his business, articles and news reports scrutinizing his every move.
So, he did the one thing he knew his father would hate more than anything else.
He joined the police academy.
Reginald hated the cops. He claimed they were nothing but a bunch of bumbling idiots running around like chickens who’s heads had been cut off. He claimed they were too far wrapped in human politics to actually save the world, and it frustrated him with how long their processes took.
Good. All the more reason to do it then.
Life at the police academy was difficult. More difficult than Diego had thought.
There were rules and regulations that his father had never had, systems that made no sense to him. The justice system was a long and broken process, often allowing criminals to get away if their pockets were deep enough or they knew the right people and the right secrets.
There was no hand to hand combat, no domino masks that sent consequences running. There were no child soldiers running around playing hero, though there were still old white men pulling the strings.
It was nothing like his old life.
He simultaneously hated and loved it.
He hated playing by yet another person’s rules.
He loved that it was someone other than his father.
He was finally someone other than Number Two Hargreeves, The Kraken. Finally something other than Sir Reginald’s science experiment he had the audacity to call his son, finally someone other than a member of the Umbrella Academy. Finally more than a number meant to make him feel inferior.
Officer Diego Hargreeves.
It had a nice ring to it.
Four little soldier boys going out to sea
A red herring swallowed one, and then there were Three
There’s simply nothing special about you, Number Seven.
For nearly thirty years, the words had haunted Viktor, twisting and turning him into the person he was today. Numb to everything, always comparing himself to others. Depressed, lonely, nervous. Nothing significant about him except his birthday and his last name.
Thirty goddamn years of being told he was ordinary, that he was nothing. That he was some sort of glitch in the system. A defect.
He’d had to write a freaking tell-all novel, just so people would know his name. And even that had blown up in his face.
He’d spent his entire life wondering what was wrong with him, why he was different from the others. Wondering if it was his fault. If it was some flaw deep inside himself.
Only it wasn’t. It was him at all.
It was dad. It was always dad.
“ I heard a rumor that you thought you were just ordinary. ”
Eleven words.
Eleven fucking words.
That was all it took to ruin somebody's life.
He adjusted his violin on his shoulder, the instrument bright white and powerful in his hands.
Look at me now, Dad, he wanted to say. Just look at me, for once in your life.
Vibrations flowed through him, the bow sliding gracefully over the strings. Music pounded in his ears, a powerful sound that sent electricity crackling through his entire body. It was a glorious, wonderful feeling. It was like flying, only better. For the first time in his life, he was free.
And he was finally going to show everyone just how special he really was.
Three little soldier boys walking in a zoo
A big bear hugged one, and then there were Two
The Sparrow Academy must come before everything and everyone else.
Growing up, that was what Sir Reginald had hammered into his second family.
You must always put each other first. Your image first.
They had all done it without question, following his instructions blindly. What Dad said went, and Dad had a lot to say.
Don’t do that.
This is what you must do.
Don’t say that.
This is what you need to say.
Don’t.
Do.
You can’t.
You must.
No.
Yes.
I said…
I never said…
I told you…
Who told you…
The Sparrow Academy…
… my orders.
Your team…
…on whose orders?
…must always come first.
…before anything and anyone else.
He was strict. They knew he was strict, but it was for their betterment.
“ Do you want to grow up to be a bunch of bumbling buffoons sitting around a dinner table and covered in bits of blown up fruit while squabbling like children? No, you do not.”
The metaphor was always so oddly specific, but it was the one he always used.
Unlike some of her other siblings, (cough, cough Jayme and Alphonso cough) Sloane had never had a problem following Dad and Marcus’s orders.
Well, most of the time. She hadn’t been happy when she had to give things up with Miguel, or when she missed her Italy trio to deal with the McIntyre incident. But she had done it without complaining, even though she’d wanted to.
She was Number Five, Gravity Girl. An obedient ray of sunshine who kept everyone in line and from killing each other.
She was a good daughter, the perfect child. She followed the rules and didn’t challenge them or ask too many questions. She just smiled and did as was told. Obedient Number Five, always agreeing that dad was right and never once hears his voice in her head saying I told you so .
The Sparrow Academy had always come first.
At least, until Luther walked into her life, and then everything changed.
Suddenly, her world was bigger than just the Sparrow Academy. Bigger than the image they’d worked so hard to build and keep up. Bigger than her six siblings who thought of her as silly little Sloane, always lost in a daydream.
The colors were brighter, the air warmer. Maybe she was crazy, but she could swear food started tasting better, the sounds around her louder and more pleasant.
For the first time in her life she’d finally met someone who put her and her wants and needs before anything else. And it felt amazing.
It wasn’t as if she meant to stray from the Sparrows. But it was just so easy to sneak around with Luther, to laugh with him and be held by him and listen to his stories and see the look on his face as he listened to her attentively. It was so much easier than sitting around with her siblings, speaking but not really talking , insults and orders passed around like a disease.
The fractures that had been made in childhood grew to cracks as the Sparrows grew apart. Sloane was –of course– the first to move on. She dreamed too big, and in following those dreams lost her entire family.
Perhaps that was the curse of being Number Five.
Maybe it didn’t matter what timeline or what person they were. Maybe Number Fives were always just destined to lose everything.
It was an untested hypothesis, made up of the bare bones of suspicion.
But it had yet to be proven wrong.
Two little soldier boys playing with a gun
One shot the other, and then there was One
The first time Lila had been handed a gun, she was ten years old.
Her parents had been gone six years, and for those six years she’d been raised at the Commission, the Handler claiming her as her own.
It was six years of spy meetings instead of tea parties, knives instead of dolls, obstacle courses instead of playgrounds.
It had been basic training disguised as a childhood, and so she hadn’t been shocked by the feel of the heavy metal in her small hands.
“Do you like it, my love?” Her Mother had purred, setting down her briefcase. “I picked it just for you.”
Lila observed the weapon carefully, eyes running over every inch of dark metal. Her finger slipped over the trigger, careful not to pull it just yet. It was heavy but balanced, the weight both foreign and familiar in her hands.
“Would you like to try it out darling?” Her Mother asked, a crimson smile on her mouth.
Lila nodded, still looking intently at the gun. She lifted her eyes and glanced around before settling on a tree in the distance.
She leveled the gun, aiming towards the center of the bark. She grasped the handle in both hands, her finger finding the trigger. She took a deep breath, steadying herself. Head low, one eye closed. Breathe in, breathe out. Steady now. A small fingering tightening on the trigger, ready to squeeze it all the way–
“Oh no, darling!” Her Mother laughed, plucking the gun from her hands. “I had a much more realistic target in mind. But you’d have to come with mummy, hmm? Does that sound alright?”
Her eyes reminded Lila of a serpent who spotted a fat little mouse scurrying across a field.
“Yes Mother,” she said, and her mother smiled in delight.
She’d grasped Lila’s hand and set it on top of the briefcase, her thumb gently pushing a button on the top.
Before Lila could blink, the two disappeared in a flash of blue.
They reappeared outside of a seedy motel that Lila imagined was home to many rats.
She imagined them pulling up in doll sized mini vans, with three little rat children complaining in the back that they were hungry and needed to pee, only to be scolded by a rat mother wearing a little lace doily and a father rat with a black whiskers that curled into a little rat mustache–
“Pay attention darling,” Mother cooed. “This is where the fun begins.”
They crept carefully up the stairs, her mother’s heels just barely tapping the concrete steps. It was deadly quiet, no light except stray moonbeams that danced on the floor.
“What are we doing?” Lila whispered. She much rather be at home, running the obstacle course again rather than here making no noise. Lila hated silence. It was dull and unsettling.
“I’ve decided it was time you performed your first correction, my love.” Mother whispered back, handing her the gun. “You see that door down the hall? It’s open. There’s a woman inside.” Mother’s eyes gleamed icy blue in the moonlight. “I want you to shoot her.”
I want you to shoot her.
The words made Lila’s heart pound in her chest.
Mother nudged her forward gently but firmly, her intention evident in the way she moved.
Lila gulped, inching forward ever so slowly. Her pulse was in her ears, her palms sweating. The gun was heavy in her hands, so much so that she nearly dropped it.
It was one thing watching agents shoot practice dummies in the training arena. It was something completely different to actually shoot somebody.
Her heart was beating so loudly she was sure a rat family was about to peek out of one of the doors and yell at her for waking them up, but no such thing occurred.
Instead gunshots broke the silence.
She glanced down at the gun in her hand, terrified that she’d accidently shot it.
But no, the noises were coming from the room that Mother had sent her too.
A woman’s voice shouted out, “Drop the gun, or you’re going down!”
Lila froze just outside the door, her breath coming out even faster than before. She peeked inside just in time to see a tall woman pointing a handgun at a bathroom door.
A hand appeared from within, tossing a gun to the floor. Another voice filtered in but Lila barely heard it.
A man stepped out of the bathroom, dressed in a suit that Lila recognized. The agent was familiar to her, someone she’d seen around the Commission. What was his name again? Hank? Hippo? Himbo?
Something like that.
The woman shouted something else, but Lila’s heart was beating too loud to hear it. She readjusted her grip on the gun, forcing herself to breath.
Huckleberry got down on his knees, glancing up at the woman.
Now Lila ! she could hear her mother’s voice drift into her head.
Lila stepped into the doorway, leveling the gun to the woman’s back. Her hands were oddly steady as she drew in a breath, squeezed her eyes shut and–
BANG!
The gun jerked in her hands.
Her eyes popped open just in time to see the woman collapse to the floor, dead.
“Well done darling!” Mother praised, stepping from behind her. “I’ve never been more proud.” She pulled a handkerchief from her pocket and dabbed at her eyes. “They grow up so fast.”
Lila froze in the doorway, still staring at the woman crumbled on the floor.
She could’ve sworn she watched her ghost climb out of her body and fade away, but she must’ve been seeing things.
“Who was she?” The question escaped before she had time to fully process it.
“Nobody important,” Mother sniffed.
They didn’t stay much longer after that, spending just enough time for Mother to threaten the agent with becoming a new correction if he didn’t complete his mission soon.
As they were walking out, the agent called out to Lila.
“Don’t worry kid,” he said. “First one’s always the hardest.”
He was right.
As the years went on, it got easier to kill, as familiar to Lila as the back of her own hand.
But she couldn’t help but always think back to her first victim, the nameless woman who had died in a rat infested hotel. She wondered who she had been, who she had loved.
Never once would she have guessed Diego Hargreeves ever being on that list.
One little soldier boy left all alone
He went and hanged himself
There were only two things Five was certain of anymore.
- He was completely, utterly alone
- It was all his fault
Nearly three years he’d been stuck alone in the apocalypse. Three years of searching for other people, three years of running away from the fact that he was the last person left alive.
It was just him, Delores, and the ghosts that lingered there, waiting in the corner of his eyes. Too many times he’d whirled around, positive he’d seen Allison, or Diego, or Ben only to find nothing but smoke and his own deteriorating sanity.
It was becoming harder and harder to distinguish reality from hallucination these days. Just yesterday he’d had a thirty minute conversation with Klaus about the Vietnam War, only to realize he was talking to air. He could’ve sworn his brother had been sitting right beside him, his dark curls blowing gently in the breeze.
They were everywhere, his siblings. Curled up in the dusty old booths at Griddy’s, rolling bowling balls at the Superstar, racing through the streets, talking in the rubble of their house. They hung around the library and laughed with Delores and eyed him with worry and sadness, and sometimes even anger. Their voices called out to him, screaming, laughing, crying.
“You should’ve stayed at the table,” Vanya whispered in his ear, her voice a gentle wind on a warm day.
“I know,” he whispered back in the dark. “I’m sorry.”
If only he had just stayed. Instead he’d join through the ice and never acorned, trapped forever in time.
“I told you so,” said his father, his voice a sharp knife dragging over his skin. Always the same words, the same message, said to him everyday, over and over again.
Five flinched at the words, his eyes trained at the ruined ground. He could feel his father staring at him with his cold hazel eyes, but refused to look up. He wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was fear, or anger, or maybe even shame. But most likely it was the knowledge that the second he looked up, he’d realize his father had never actually been there at all, and he’d be alone again.
Which was worse; being with someone who wouldn’t let you forget your own stupidity or being alone for the rest of all time and space?
Most would say they’d rather be alone. But all that told him was that they’d never truly been alone.
He stared at the ground awhile longer, if for no other reason than to feel seen, even if for only a few more minutes.
The days were long and lonely, each one worse than the last. His mind was always loud, full of doubts, numbers, and his sibling’s voices. Sometimes they comforted him; other times they accused him, or screamed about what a traitor he was.
It was one of those nights, when his siblings came crying and told him that it was his fault that they were dead.
“You did this to us,” Luther told him, perfect blond hair streaked with blood. “You weren’t here to save us and now we’re dead.”
“It’s not my fault,” Five said, unconvincingly.
“It is,” Diego hissed.
“It should’ve been you,” Allison spit.
“Why Five?” Klaus wailed, dust coating his dark curls. “Why did you do this to us?”
“What did we do?” Ben choked, blood dribbling down his chin. “Whatever it was, we’re sorry.”
“Five, please! I don’t want to die!” Vanya screamed.
Five threw his hands over his ears, turning away. He wanted to run, to get away.
It wasn’t his fault.
It wasn’t .
“Keep running little Number Five,” his father called after him. “That seems to be the one thing you excel at.”
Air whipped behind him, roaring in his ears. Dust kicked up in his path, a map of footprints blazing behind him. His legs pumped and burned, screaming at him to stop. Yet he persisted, moving as far away as his feet would carry him.
Space spasmed in front of him, his hands twitching with anticipation. The smell of ozone was thick in the air, blue light flickering around him. Time and space oozed between his fingertips, a familiar itch creeping up his spine. He grasped space and grasped at its edges, wanting nothing more than to shove himself inside, ready to go home, to get back, to fix everything. He fingers grasped, fumbled, finally holding on and tearing into like a wild animal, stepping inside and yes , he was finally doing it, he was finally going to make the jump—
Only to be spat out only a few feet away, his foot catching on stray debris as he rolled across the ground. Bits of rock and glass cut into his skin, each marking his flesh like tic marks of his failures.
He rolled to a stop, dust and ash flying up into his face. It stung his nostrils, coating his tongue. Warm blood ran down his face, but he couldn’t help but feel like he deserved it.
It’s your fault.
It should’ve been you.
Told you so.
Why Five? Why are you doing this?
Your fault.
Please!
I told you.
We’re sorry.
I don’t want to die!
Should’ve been you.
Why?
Your. Fault.
Keep running.
Stayed at the table…
I told you.
Little Number Five…
He closed his eyes as the sky opened up, the world crying for him. He knew he should move, to get inside and seek shelter.
But instead he stayed on the ground, leaving his body to the elements. Maybe it would just keep raining and raining and raining, and the dust would turn to mud, and the earth would swallow him whole.
Or maybe the rain would be full of acid that could sink into his skin and poison his body, shutting it down one organ at a time.
Or maybe he would just lay here until he starved, waiting for death to scoop him up in her cold arms and carry him to the grave.
It didn’t matter to him.
Five just wanted to die.
He was tired of this place, this twisted version of the city he’d grown up in. Everywhere he went was a cruel reminder of what had once been, what he had once had.
The voices in his head only got louder, his siblings appearing more and more often. One minute they were there, young and laughing and happy, and then he’d blink and they were covered in blood and dust, dead in the rubble of the place he’d once called his home.
The vision haunted him, sometimes so vivid that the only way to get rid of it was to drag one of Diego’s old knives over his wrists until a new kind of pain took over.
He really, truly hoped that the rain would just hurry up and kill him.
Otherwise he couldn’t imagine how Diego would feel knowing Five had bled himself to death using one of his knives.
And Then There Were None