888 ✺ Five Hargreeves

SIX: Negative Nelly

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         Eight wandered about Reggie's office as soon as Five and her got back to the academy. She roamed her fingers through his dense collection of files and notes dedicated to his studies on the children throughout the years. She skipped over major parts of her life in order to try to find any source of how her powers could be acting up. Her powers were the one thing she didn't hate, so not having access to them wasn't acceptable for her.

She stopped her scurrying fingers as soon as she saw a blurb from a file dedicated to Number Eight's use of the Mystic Arts. She narrowed her eyes on the label and pulled it out of the tight file cabinet. She flipped the front page open and was presented a pile of developed photos captured while she was training as a child. 

Her fingers traced the shape of her younger face as she frowned at the picture taken from a security camera of her being trapped in a room entirely made out of mirrors, designed for her to unpredict what was fake or real. She remembers being locked in that room, along with many other types of optical illusions as a child, some of the worst years of her life.

Before she was able to get any further the file was pulled out from her grasp. The sudden movement scared her as she grabbed her chest out of fear, "Master Eight, what do you think you're doing?" Pogo asked, looking rather disappointed. 

She reached for the file once more, only to be denied by him placing the file behind his back. Frustrated, she narrowed her eyes further on his figure, confused as to why he wouldn't allow her to read her own file, "Reading my file," she answered, "Give it back to me." 

He shook his head, "I'm sorry, Miss. Winona but I'm afraid I cannot do that." he answered, seeming slightly disappointed. 

"Why not?" she asked. 

He shook his head again, "This was one of Reginald's last wishes and I must obey it." 

The new information made her even more confused, "Why?" she asked, "I need to know what's wrong with me." 

"I'm sorry Master Eight," he denied, backing away from the girl with a saddened look, "I cannot do that." he repeated. 

She scoffed, "I'm not leaving without it." This file was her last hope.

Pogo shook his head, "this was ordered by Reginald." He tried to reason.

She crossed her arms in anger, "Why do you stand up for him?" she bitterly asked, "If anything, you should be the one to lash out on him." 

"Reginald Hargreeves was my Master," he scoffed, "I will forever be in his debt."

She sarcastically chuckled out of disbelief, "After everything he's done to you," she shook her head, "after everything he's done to us-"

"He always had good intentions when you wer-"

"He was a monster, Diego was right." she cut him off, looking at the ape in disbelief, "We were children." 

Pogo looked down to his feet with a heavy sigh as he leaned upon his cane, file still held behind him with his free hand. Eight continued to look at him in disbelief, maybe even with a hint of disgust, "We were just little ki-" she tried to repeat.

"Enough Number Eight!" Pogo raised his voice, getting sick of the girl's cruel words toward his Master, "I think you should leave." he spoke, now at a normal volume but still sounding stern. 

The girl looked back at him with hardened eyes. As much as she wished the words could bounce off of her, they absolutely cut her in half. She always has felt like an outsider but now she really was, everything she feared was true. She looked away as she felt her eyes glaze over, refusing to allow any tears to actually fall. She simply scoffed and turned on her heel, quickly making her way down the hall of the academy.