006. INQUISITIVE DEAN

✎ S1E1 ⇢ ˗ˏˋ PART 6 , 2019

|"THE NAME OF THE GAME"
     "They're all like that?"

Dean currently sits on a chair by Hughie. Taking a sip of his drink as he listens to him and Butcher run about. His phone vibrates in his pocket, and he slips it out from the left pocket. He glances at the two, then looks back at who texted him.

❪ Kevin!!! ❫
Dude, me and Starlight
just hit it; you gotta try it
sometime with her, man! You
won't regret it!

What a douche, Dean thinks as he puts his phone away. Starlight just got with the team, and Deep is already manipulating her. I need to talk with her. It seems like Dean needs to do a lot of things lately...Stillwell was the only reason he had him as a contact, and her higher-up decided it was an excellent way to get to know your teammates. This backfired since they have yet to text, let alone leave a message on read.

"All of them? Even homelander?...Rebound?" Dean sees Hughie give a hopeful look when saying his supe name as if Hughie needs one good thing in his life to stay constant. When hearing his name, Dean turns to them and rests his head on his left palm, elbow on the table, while sipping his drink.

"Homelanders the exception. He doesn't drink, doesn't smoke. Man's a saint. Rebound, on the other hand...." Butcher paused to look at Dean. Butcher smugs at Dean before returning his gaze to Hughie. "Not much on him, other than he likes to sleep with whole lotta women. It seems your mate does nothin' illegal."

Hughie pauses momentarily and lets out a noticeable sigh but then shakes his head. "I don't- I don't know Rebound; you talk as if I knew him." Dean stops sipping and nervously scratches his stubble. He looks at the table and back to Butcher, where he finds him laughing.

Butcher smacks the table twice. "Hughie, you're a naive little lad. If only you knew...." Hughie smiles in confusion and looks at Dean; to which he only shrugs and continues to sip to ease the awkward silence.

Butcher looks at the two amused but continues to ramble on about what he's here for. "As for the rest of 'em, yeah. Pardon my French, fuck those fuckers." Well, at least I know he doesn't despise me. Dean takes another sip of his drink and looks at it to see it's near empty; he contemplates whether to leave it be or grab another drink. I kind of want out of this situation for a bit...fuck it. Another drink.

"Hey, ima get another drink. Could you uh..." Dean motions with his hand at Hughie to scoot his chair in.

Hughie looks at his chair and then up at Dean. "Yeah- yeah." Hughie scoots in, and Dean starts to walk.

"Thanks." Hughie kept his gaze on Dean as he left, while subconsciously doing a one over on him. But returned back to Butcher when Dean was out of sight.

Dean walks up to the bar and sits on a stool while an employee comes up to him. "Refill?"

"Yeah, coke, please?" Dean lets out a smile and pushes the glass cup toward the worker.

"Sure." Once the worker left to refill, Dean leaned forward and sighed. He rummages his fingers through his unkempt hair while keeping his eyes closed. Dean's ears pick up on someone walking, and they sit beside him.

He listens as the unknown person shifts in their seat, and they turn at Dean to watch him. "Rough Day?" The stranger spoke.

Dean lets go of his hair and look at the person. The voice was female, no doubt about it. Her face was hidden under glasses, and her hair covered most of her face. He looked at her appearance and saw she wore all black. She did not want to be known. "Guess you can say that."

He glances at her body once more. She took notice. "Like what you see?" she smugs.

He shook his head. Her voice had a slight disorienting pitch to it as if it was intend. No matter the case, Dean let it slide. "I mean, can't really see what's underneath. You seem familiar...do I know you?"

Her smugness disappears. "No, and I imply to keep it that way." Dean raises his hand and shakes them to let her know he understands. She smiles, gets up, pats his shoulder, then whispers in his ear. "I'll see you around...Dean." He looks at the counter while shaking his head. women...wait, she knew my name. I didn't tell her my name...

"Hey, how'd you...." She was gone as soon as he turned around; he didn't even hear the door open and close. "...know my name...that was weird." Dean looks where Butcher is and sees Hughie stand up frantically.

"Here's your drink, sir." He glances behind him, grabs it, and returns to where they are.

Right as he makes it, Hughie leaves. Dean stands in confusion and glances at Butcher. "What'd you say?"

Butcher leans back and clicks his fingernails on the table. "Nothin' Hughie couldn't handle; he'll come around. Now..." Butcher sits up straighter. "I believe you owe me a chat."

Dean scoffs and sits down where Hughie previously was. "I don't owe you shit."

Butcher nods. "I'll give you that one, mate." Dean sees him remove another file from his bag and place it on the table.

He looks between Butcher and the file. "What is this?" Deans says as he points towards it.

"Well, lad, your life- well, your actual past life, that you know nothin' about. I had to do more research on ya, fuckers erased everything on you. Practically made you brand new. And dont worry, didnt read what I didn't need to know."

Dean scratches his head. He knows his life; what is he missing?... Dean leans in his chair and crosses his arms. "Sorry to burst your bubble mate, but I know my life."

"Do ya now? Tell me, what's the earliest thing you know?" Dean smiles and begins to respond but can't seem to. That's weird.

"You can't, can you? The earliest you probably know is that you're born from a lab; your brother is homelander, yada yada." Butcher grabs the file and shakes it mid-air. "This got everything you need to know about yourself, and lemme tell you, you're pretty valuable than they credit you for, lad."

Dean scrunches his face at Butcher and reaches out for the file, but Butcher brings it to himself. "Nu-uh, I need you to do somethin' for me, and in return, I'll give you the file. How's that sound?"

Dean looks at Butcher, confused. "And what exactly do you need me to do?"

Butcher smiles creepily and leans in. "Glad you ask. I just need you to be a little..." Butcher clicks his tongue while shaking his head from side to side. "...double agent for a while, Dean. Won't give you trouble." Butcher spoke with his raspy voice.

Scoffing, Dean shifts in his chair. "You want me to spy. Spy on who?"

Butcher grabs Dean's drink and takes a sip from it. His face looks disgusted, and he puts the glass back down. "On Vought and your team, lad. Just need reports whenever I check on ya, or when you come visit. You know. Check-in, check-out. Job done, yeah?" He motions his hands as he speaks.

"You know how much trouble I'll be if I do this for you?" Dean couldn't believe the nerve of this guy. It is scary enough that he has tension with John just because, but give him a reason...Dean probably won't see tomorrow.

"But you'll do it anyway, huh? I mean, you practically lived for violence. And you're a supe; you'll live." Dean shakes his head, looking to the side.

Butcher senses Dean's disagreement and groans. "Oi, you'll get the file when I say your job is finished. Kapeesh?"

Dean shakes his head and gets up. "Fine, we done?"

Butcher nods and places his head in his hands. "Yeah mate, you can get outta my ass now." Dean and Butcher share a laugh.

Dean spoke once more before leaving. "Have Hughie call me when he can."

"Sure."

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     The next day arrived, and the first couple of things on his list were to do good deeds, have team meetings, visit Hughie, and whatever else came up as he went. He hears Starlight approaching with the click of her heels to the door. Dean swiveled in his chair as he and his team waited for her. He whistles yet another tune from Billy Joel, entirely in his supe costume: mask and everything.

"She's almost here," Dean affirms with the team as he looks around and sees everyone doing their own thing. Except for Black Nior, he is always listening. Homelander is the only one who takes Dean's words in, stands up from his chair beside Dean, and places his hands behind his back.

Homelander's face twitches when he sees no one acknowledge Dean's statement. "I believe..." Upon speaking, everyone's heads went up and focused on Homelander. He smiles. The smile was forced as his lips stretched as far as they could. "My brother told you something...right?"

The team's bodies seemed to stiffen as he spoke. Dean quietly sighed, but it was still caught by John, as John gave Dean glances with his eyes. Homelander then looks at every one of them, but no response is given. He then points to Deep. "Deep..." He walks where Deeps' chair is, stands behind, grabs him by the shoulders, and gives a noticeably hardened squeeze. "What did my brother say?"

Dean looks Deep into the eyes as John speaks. Deep stumbles over his words, and he keeps a straight face. "Just- just uh wanted to let us know Starlight is almost here."

Homelander pats him on his shoulders. "Good."

Deep lets out a sigh as Homelander walks back to his chair. "Dean is your co-leader, so I expect some respect towards him. Whenever we tell you something, you answer. Okay, guys? It's that simple."

"Yup, absolutely. You got it, homelander." Deep gives a smile and a thumbs-up.

It put John out of a lesser attitude and into a calmer stature. "Okay..." Homelander rubs his hands together. "She's here now. Best behavior, everyone."

Maeve, A-train, Translucent, Deep, and Dean spoke at the same time,

"Sure"

"Whatever"

"Yeah"

"Absolutely"

"Yup"

The doors open to Starlight, walking to her designated chair with the sounds of heels clicking. One after the other. Starlight catches the gaze of Dean and shares a quick smile which Dean does back as well. "Starlight. You don't want to be late to your first official meeting. I had a whole welcome speech planned."

"Sorry, sir," She spoke with sincerity.

Homelander waves her off and begins to sit down. "Please. Homelander's fine."

Dean begins to fumble with the papers before him while hearing Deep speak. "Beginning to wonder if you'd even show up. I mean, all that pressure, it's a lot for anyone to swallow." Dean listens as he reads off the papers. I assumed this was about what he texted me yesterday...probably is.

Once fully seated, Starlight counters Deeps' statement. "Yeah. Don't worry. I'll be fine. I'm here, and I'm not going anywhere."

Translucent interrupts with his banter of problems. "Can we get back to this, please? This is a serious crime. These assholes pirated my movie three weeks before release, and you can't walk down 5th Avenue without bumping into a table of unlicensed Homelander shirts. Copyright infringement is costing Vought $1.2 Billion per year. That's money out of our pockets."

Dean stares at the papers Transulent gave him. "Dude, do you want to impose criminal penalties on fans? A $1.2 billion loss of money is nothing compared to what most of our movies make, whether or not it gets pirated. And the gross income for the company is good enough. Our pay is plausible; what are you crying about?"

Translucent glasses turn to Dean, and Dean assumes he giving him a 'wtf' look based on his response. "I would if it gets them to stop doing that. And my complaining is reasonable; you don't hear me bitching about who I sleep with."

Dean slams his papers on the table. "We are not going to go-" Dean gets stopped mid-sentence by Homelander placing a hand on his shoulder. Dean looks at him, and homelander shakes his head as if to stop engaging in the conversation. Dean nods and leans in his chair.

Transulent continues with a cough. "Anyway... We've all got, what, four points each?"

"What the fuck? You got four points?" A-train commented as Transulents speech put him to a stop.

Maeve decides to pip in. "And clearly better lawyers."

Homelander stops all the ranting. "Hey, hey, hey guys, come on. Stop. What's Starlight gonna think?" In all honesty, Dean forgot Starlight was there for a second. "Listening to us haggling over nickels. We're the seven, for god's sake. Whether we're out there or we're in here. Now, what I do want to hear is who you saved this week. Huh? Who's up for that?" He looked around and decided to pick on Dean. "Dean..."

Everybody's attention was now on him. "Who did you save this week?"

"If you mean by saved, he probably made the most ugly women cum more than ever." Deep chuckles as he hits transluent on the arm. To which transulent laughs at his joke.

"Ha-ha, very funny." Dean shakes his head and mumbles. "Dumbass," Homelander heard his mutter and gave a quick smile.

"If you wanna know, Deep, I actually saved multiple people from an oncoming car crash...."

════════════════════════════

     Once the meeting was over, everyone started to leave to do their own thing, the only ones left in the room were Dean and John. Dean wanted to see if John knew anything about the information the file had on him. "Hey Jo- Homelander?"

Almost at the door, John turned to Dean. "Yes, Dean?"

"Just hypothetically, you would tell me anything if it concered me right? no matter if it was bad or good?" Dean spoke as he walks up to homelander.

Homelander head shifts to the side as he took in Deans question, looking up and down at him. "Of course Dean, why the question?"

"Oh, nothing, just wanted to know." Homelander stared at Dean once more, shook his head. Dean hoped he was believeable enough.

He comes closer to Dean and hugs him. "If there is anything trouble you brother you can always tell me. You love me right?" Dean stood still in shock at the sudden affection. Homelander squeezed more than one should, but not enough to kill. It made Dean have trouble catching his breath.

"Yeah, John. I- I love you." Homelander stays in place before relaseing his hold on Dean.

He holds Dean by the shoulders and smiles. "Good. Don't want anything bad to happen huh. we're in this together." Homelander took his leave right after saying that, not before shouting right as the door closed. "Take care Dean."

Should of been more careful with my choice of words...Dean lets out a gratful sigh and walks to his chair. He spends his next hour relaxing in the room. Once those 30 mintues were finished, Dean heard erratic footsteps approaching the door as he sat in his chair. It wasn't any of his team's footsteps; who could it be? The door opens, and Hughie steps in. Oh, Shit, why is he here? Dean gets out of his chair, and while he does, Hughie notices the supe's presence.

"Oh- Rebound, it's uh a pleasure to meet you." Hughie sticks out his hand once, stopping by a chair.

Rebound takes his hand and shakes it. "Sup, I..." Dean lets go of his hand and congers up the confidence to talk, and he coughs. "On behalf of A-train, I sincerely apologize for what happened yesterday. He was not in his right mind."

Hughie nods and stares into space without responding but soon returns to the present. "Of course, thank you."

Rebound nods and starts to leave and pats Hughie's shoulder. Out of nowhere, Hughie places a firm hand on Rebounds. Shocked, Rebound Stammers. "Uh- dude- you good?"

Hughie stares in confusion as his face hardness but releases his hold. His expression goes back to a smile. "Sorry, I just had a- you know what? It's nothing to worry about."

Rebound looks at Hughie skeptically. "Sure...take care, buddy." Rebound begins to take his leave. He hoped Hughie didn't discover who he was because that'd be an awkward conversation. The rest of Dean's day was spent being a supe and doing errands. When night came, he spent the rest of his time waiting for Hughie at his job as Dean.