Plot Bunnies - The Umbrella Academy
Original Character - Tahlia
On the twelfth hour of the first day of October 1989, 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, eccentric billionaire and adventurer, resolved to locate and adopt as many of the children as possible. He got seven of them. Of the remaining 36, some remained in loving families, others unloving. Some led remarkable lives, others mundane.
One, however, on the third hour of second day of October 1989, disappeared quite entirely.
The Commission was not a place for children. Tahlia had always known this. After all, she’d never seen another child there. All who walked the halls seemed quite resolved to stand over five feet in height and wear shoes that clacked. But it was still home in all ways she was given to understand. Among the marbled walls and offices was nestled a room with a bed, warm covers, and a mural of green fields and wildflowers. One woman would bring her food and another brought her books. Someone taught her lessons and held her hand while she cried. They took turns and often never came back, but they all wore simpering smiles and patted her kindly on the shoulder before they left. The only one who kept coming was the pretty lady with white hair and dark glasses. She brought a notebook and crayons and all sorts of questions.
Tahlia had all the answers. Or so she was told. It didn’t seem to matter much when she barely understood the question. But The Handler always left her room with a pleased, though twisted smile on her perfectly painted lips, so she must have done well. Who is next? Who is in the way? What is the deadline? Where will they be? Ask her anything – anything at all – and her hand always scribbled out an answer. Sometimes a name, sometimes an address. Longitude, latitude, a crudely drawn map, the configuration of stars on a very specific night in November of 1963. She’d scratch it out on a piece of paper and The Handler would take it, fold it neatly, and slide it into a tube.
Until, one day, Tahlia followed a tube. After all, even shut-ins are permitted the odd act of teenage rebellion. As acts of defiance go it was simple enough. Restrained, even. A single late night stroll, one opened suitcase, and Tahlia found what all her little slips of paper added up to. The end of the world. And suddenly, after a childhood of sitting still, she had to learn to run.
Years passed in fists filled with paper, failed assassination attempts, close calls, and blood stains scrubbed out of clothes. From the age of fourteen she learned fast, travelled light, and made sure to duck. And while life sometimes proved more pleasant with fresh air in her lungs and pizza in her belly, she found her power more difficult to maneuver when she asked the questions and picked apart the clues. The bullets didn’t help either.
One day, though, she managed to get a straight answer. Where do I find help? ‘Griddy’s Donuts’ scratched its way into park bench paint with the sharp end of a paper clip. Two old friends, a grumpy teen, one black coffee, and it’s the end of the world as we know it.