TOUCH | F. Hargreeves

01

Beau stood before an older man, one that was stoic and seemingly emotionless but he could feel it; the man was amazed by him and it was all because of the things Beau could do, things no one else could. Beau was special and the man told him so as he crouched down and introduced himself to the young boy with no ounce of any sort of emotion in sight.

Reginald Hargreeves was a man that took in special children, trained them and gave them purpose. It didn't exactly make him a kind man but it did make him an important one.

After Beau's father rang Reginald with the information of his dead wife and his powerful and difficult child he knew he had to make him a part of his Umbrella Academy. With such a special addition they would be an unstoppable team. And so, after making the trip to meet Beau he could already tell he was one of the most powerful beings he had met.

Reginald told him he wanted Beau to be the new addition to an elite team of children like himself.

"Why number zero?" Beau asked with slight interest heard in his voice, his eyes narrowed in thought of what a single number could bring to him and what being called a number might affect his state of mind when it was already warped and pulled in every direction.

Reginald gave a small smile, his wrinkled face anything but welcoming but his voice and accent rather comforting, "Because if I had gotten to you at the time I had gotten the others you would have been my number one."

So there were other numbers, all of them somewhat like him and exceptionally different from the rest. Was that supposed to give him a level of comfort? Beau wasn't so sure.

"There are others?"

"Seven of them. Though one of them is more... ordinary than the rest." Reginald turned his eyes away and that was how Beau knew it was a lie but the fact that the man's mind was completely blank did not confirm it. His mind only repeated the words he said before he said them and a distinct sound of the wind blowing through trees was heard.

Beau's jaw clenched, "... How have you blocked your mind from me?"

Reginald felt rather proud of himself at seeing the young boy stumped, to see him unable to roam around his mind so easily, although beyond that was a different story. "Well, dear boy, after hearing of your ability I thought it best to practise. My mind is completely blank."

Of course, the memories, the flashbacks, the trauma was all there to be seen and read but Beau wasn't looking for that, he was looking for things to hold him to the present.

"How so?" Beau's head tilted to the side slightly, wanting to figure out how the man he had never met was able to shut him out when no one else ever could, not even his parents.

The man tapped his temple his other resting on his cane, "I'm only thinking of what I am about to say. Listen." Reginald softly demanded, the two staring into one another's eyes as he began to speak clearly and firmly inside his mind, 'It's a tricky thing but after practising I was able to clear my mind completely, isn't it miraculous?'

Beau's eyes lit up suddenly, a grin taking over his features, 'It's wonderful! I can't hear anything. It's so quiet.'

Reginald could see it was causing the boy pain to hear everything people were lying about, to hear their fears and their joys, hear what they had and he didn't. And after hearing how Beau's father spoke of him he could tell the man did not think kind things of his son at all. Reginald wondered if his mother was any different.

"Do you like the quiet, Beau?"

"Yes." Beau nodded somewhat frantically at the question, "It's always so loud so when it's quiet I can actually hear myself instead of everyone else."