007. ROUND ONE...FIGHT!

✎ S1E1 ⇢ ˗ˏˋ PART 7 , 2019

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"THE NAME OF THE GAME"
     Later in the night. Dean goes to Hughie's job, considering he has nothing else to do. Doing requirements as Rebound during the day, he could be himself at night. He wore a white dress shirt, black dress pants, black dress shoes, and a black watch on his right wrist. He stops footsteps away from the door and checks his appearance in a reflective window. Not too shabby... He closes in on the door and opens it to find another worker.

The doorbell chimed and let the worker know a customer entered. The man turns around and sees Dean walk in. "Hello, How may I help you?"

Dean crosses his arms and looks around the store. His dress shirt straining against his muscles. "Uh yeah, uh is Hughie here?" He looks at the worker and then at his name tag, Gary.

Gary fixes up what he's doing and gestures with a hand behind him. "Yeah he's outback, he'll be-," Right as Gary spoke, Hughie makes his appearance known as he come from the back. Huhgie keeps his eyes glued to the ground, his posture slumped as if he had a bad day.

"Hughie, someone's here for you." Hughie looks up and makes eye contact with Dean, his worn-out expression turned into a content smile. He eagerly walks behind the counter and takes a seat.

Huhgie leans against the glass counter with his right arm on it and puts his head on it. While his left-hand messes with his name tag. "Hi, What you uh- what you doing here?" They share a smile longer than usual until Dean breaks it off, he walks closer to Huhgie. Dean sat atop the counter to the right, looking Hughie up and down. Hughie withers in his seat as he felt Dean's eyes never leave his body once.

Dean sighs and begins talking. "I assume you don't really get business during the night, so why not visit you? I mean I did it last time." Huhgie nods his head more than once and laughs.

"Yeah, yeah I guess so." They both sat there in silence until Hughie spoke again, pointing a finger at Dean. "Correct me if I'm wrong but aren't you here on a business trip as a consultant- did you just finish...whatever a consultant does?" Hughie spoke, lazily pointing his finger at Dean's figure.

Totally forgot about that, good thing I dressed formally. Dean made a mental note that reminded himself to dress as such more often because of his 'job'. "Yeah- uh some things came up and I'm staying here longer than usual. I hope that's not a bad thing."

Huhgie shook his head in disapproval. He was glad Dean was staying longer because he at least won't be lonely. To be honest with himself, Dean's presence took off the bad things that lately happened off his mind. "No, not at all. I'm glad you're staying longer."

"Good," Dean responded. They both gave glances at eachother before hearing a tv news reporter speak,

"Policing cities is a thorny issue as it is, but allowing superheroes into national defense? We'd basically privatizing war..."

Gary, Hughie's co-worker lets out a cough, turning both their attention to him. "Good night Hughie. You'll lock up?" Gary spoke as he advanced to the front door.

"Yeah- yeah. Thanks, Gary." As Gary left Dean was about to continue talking to Hughie until he heard the door open again but nothing came through. He only knew one person this could possibly be, Translucent.

Fuck...

Hughie spoke as he heard the door chime. "Sorry, we're closing up." After hearing no response Hughie scrunches his face in confusion.

"Hughie..." Dean spoke in a concerned manner. If this is Translucent, would Dean have to use his powers...god, he hopes not.

All that could be heard was footsteps gradually coming closer to the two. Then a naggy voice spoke up but neither Hughie nor Dean could see where it came from. "Who are you?"

Dean hops off the counter and mentally gets ready as Hughie curses and stands up rapidly. "Right in front of you, prick. You think I wouldn't find this thing?" Hearing the voice speak, made Dean agree with his assumptions that this was 100% Translucent. He begins to hold up some sort of circular device unknown to Dean.

What the hell is that?

Dean watched as he took hold of Hughie's name tag and tugged it to him. Pronouncing his name with distaste, "Huhgie..." He then slams him on the counter, resulting in the counter breaking, as he slid Hughie out behind the counter.

"You pussy, I followed you from the fucking tower!" Translucent yells. Dean sees him throw Hughie towards the window as Hughie shouts persistent no's at him. Huhgie's forehead began to have blood dripping down. Groaning in pain, he was unable to get back up. "Who was that guy you were with, in the car? Who was he!? He put you up to this?"

"I don't know! He was just some Uber driver okay?" Huhgie quickly says as he gives a glance at Dean, not knowing what to do.

Dean begins to walk in front of Hughie until a vexed voice screeches. "Don't you fucking move!"

Fuck...Sorry Hughie.

He walks in front of Hughie and gives a disappointed gaze at him. Hughie looks at him in confusion, with glassy eyes. Dean then watches as Translucent rips out a tv mounted on the wall and it aims at them, coming closer. Dean didn't care about exposing himself to Hughie anymore, Huhgie was in danger. That was enough for him to not care about himself and instead care for Hughie's wellbeing. "The hell are you doing Translucent!?" Dean speaks in an irritated voice.

The tv stops a few inches away from him. "Did you know about the fucking bug too!?"

Huhgie was perplexed and spoke in a worried voice, looking frantically between them. "Dean, how do you-"

"Not now Hughie!" Dean pointed a finger at him and diverts his attention back to his co-worker. "No, dammit. I didn't. I would have told you if I did."

"So what, hanging out with lowlives now? Do you know what Homelander would do to you if he finds out what you're doing in your free time? If I told him you helped this fucking nine-to-five kid, plant a bug at the company!?" Dean's eyes never left the tv, watching if he ever lets it go.

Dean blew a strand of his hair going over his eyes, getting closer to him. "You know homelander can tell if you lie right? Wouldn't look too good on you buddy."

"Well there is one thing that's true, you've been hangout out with the kid that started this in the first place. He's gonna tear you to fucking shreds Dean! You hear me!" Dean sees the tv shaking in Translucent's grasp.

Giving a smug look, Dean raises an eyebrow. "You think he cared about a fucking kid planting a bug? He'll kill him without anyone knowing, Vought's pretty good at covering shit like this up."

Hughie started to fit the pieces together and realizes Dean somehow knew the whole team. Was he a supe? Dean always reminded him of Rebound but didn't really put Dean as the superhero-saving type. If he was, he'd have a hard time trusting him, he already losing trust in him now. Dean failed to mention his affiliation with the seven.

"Homelander always saw the good in you, never thinks you do anything wrong, boy is gonna have a hell of a ride," Translucent laughed with an indecorous tone. "You're fucked Rebound!"

He raises the tv and throws it at them. Dean aims his hand and propels the tv off to the side. He hears his footstep running at him. Dean aim his hand hoping it was aimed behind translucent and made another tv come off. It came speeding at Dean, not before hitting Translucent in the back of his, well he hoped. He hears a loud thump on the ground, assuming he fell. Dean grabs the tv at the last second and aims it at translucent. But to his disadvantage, he couldn't exactly see him, he got surprised when he felt a punch in his cheek. Making him drop the tv, as the hit continued. Right as he tried to grab ahold of translucent by erratically grabbing the air. A car came rushing through the store and hit them both, throwing them to the end of the store.

Damn, that hurt.

Dean was thrown against the store's racks and got up, blood pouring out of his nose. He is pretty sure, he broke his nose. "Sorry about that lad!" He hears that annoying ass British voice, Butcher.

Wiping his nose off on his sleeve, he exhales. "Could have given me a damn warning."

Butcher waves a crowbar back and forth in his hand "Now where's the fun in that? Go help Hughie outta here, I got this cunt." Butcher signals with a head nod behind him.

Giving Butcher a nod, he runs to Hughie who was still slumped against the broken window. He gets on his knees. "Hughie we gotta go, come on." Dean places his hands against Hughies shoulders, grabbing them firmly.

Hughie pushes Dean by the shoulder which made Dean fall flat on his butt. Hughie gave him a hardened gaze and got up himself. "I can get up myself."

Dean didn't get mad at him, he understood why he was acting like this. "I'm sorry okay but now isn't the time for this."

Hughie looks at Dean and then at Butcher, who was fighting Translucent. He then bolted to the back door, Dean following him with a sigh. They kept going until Hughie stopped at the door. "What is it?" Dean asks.

Huhgie runs past Dean, giving him not one ounce of acknowledgment. He slowly stays behind Hughie, curious as to what a mere human can do against a supe. If that is what he was planning to do. They make it back to see Butcher laying on the floor covered in blood, while translucent was now seen to the naked eye due to the blood on him. Huhgie quietly makes it behind Translucent, grabbing ahold of the wire that was connected to the tv translucent took.

Butcher gives a discreet smug to Dean before speaking. "'Translucent' doesn't even mean, 'invisible'. It means semi-transparent." he kicks him, which makes him stagger back and get hit by the electricity from the wire cable. Dean was astonished, translucent's cries of agony were heard as the cable electrocutes him from his ass-cheek. The bitch had it coming.

All three of them take a moment to collect their breath until Huhgie was the first to speak. "Is he- Is he dead?" Dean stands awkwardly as he watches Butcher kick the shit out of his teammate.

"Well, he ain't moving." Dean laughs as he dusted himself off. Hughie spews out curses as he continues to collect this breath. "How'd you know electric could do the job?"

Dean was impressed by Hughie, he didn't really think about that. Maybe Hugie is just that smart. "Skin's carbon. Highly Conductive- saw it on uh, Jimmy Fallon."

Dean walks to Translucent, getting down on one knee, inspecting him. "Would've taken me forever to work that one out. Good job." Butcher walks by Dean. "Let's get him in the boot."

Huhgie stammers over his words as he heard what Butcher said. "The truck." Butcher emphasizes. "Lad, a help here? You have all the brawns." Butcher asks Dean. He rolls his eye and bends down and grabs translucent from under, hoping not to grab anything he wouldn't want to. He finds his way under Translucent's armpits and legs and hoists him up and makes his way to the trunk as Huhgie and Butcher continued to argue. Translucent weighed nothing to Dean, most likely due to his power. Making it to the end of the car, he opens it and throws him, hoping he was fully in there. He slammed the trunk shut but it didn't close all the way. Dean reaches across the opening and feels his hand sticking out. Shit...my bad dude. He places his hand in the trunk and closes it. Making his way back.

"And you're- you're a federal officer you know? Just call the fucking FBI." He hears Huhgie speaking freneticlly.

Dean sit on top of the hood with his arms crossed, looking at the two waste their breath away. "Yeah, o-okay, so, look, technically I'm not a Fed." Butcher spoke with a guilty voice.

"What!?" Dean looks off to the side, guilty as well. He didn't even tell huhgie about his so called consultant job that isn't even real but judging from how Hughie handle what had just happened, he probably concluded it was fake as well. "Then who the fuck are you!?"