Chapter Text
The sun beat down on Naim’s face and the long grass tickled his ankles as all he could think about was how badly he wanted to go home already. Why was he doing this again? Why was he walking around the Believe Expo?
Well, he knew why, although it didn’t seem worth it right now as he looked around at all the rows and rows of religious memorabilia in front of him. If he had a backbone and any ounce of athleticism in his body, he would’ve run away by now.
But he looks at the backs of Hughie, M.M., and Butcher’s heads and he has to tell himself that he’s doing this for them.
He’s doing this for his dad, too.
Naim and his mother moved to New York almost five years ago following his father’s death. He remembers when she burst into his room and told him to pack up, that they were leaving. Some members of the church they attended had thought it wise to plead Arlene to leave, telling her that God wanted her to heal away from the house where Thomas was killed. It felt like before Naim could even blink, they were already on a plane to America.
He’d never admit it out loud, but sometimes he misses his hometown - a small old place called Bandee. He and his mother lived in a shabby, two-bedroom house next to an old mill, their closest neighbors being a field’s length away. If Naim thought hard enough, he could conjure up little details about the place: the smell of his old room, the leaky bathroom ceiling, his dad’s head getting smashed in like a watermelon, Naim watching it happen.
He wonders if the driveway concrete there is still stained with his father’s blood.
It had been an ugly stain, and an even uglier sight. Thomas Reid was just trying to go to work when a random supe had appeared in a drunken stupor. Naim never learned the supe’s name, and his father hadn’t either.
Little thirteen-year-old Naim watched with bated breath as his dad pushed the supe away after trying to accost him. A second later, Thomas was thrown to the ground and a foot was through his face.
Naim sat glued to the spot, a Translucent plushie clutched close to his chest. When morning came, and his mother found the body, he just sat and watched her too.
Before he knew it, he was being dragged out of his room and into the car, his mother’s small hands pressed against his eyes when they walked by the corpse. He never told her this, but he found one of his father’s teeth lodged into his slipper on the car ride to their church.
When they got to the chapel, Arlene pushed him inside and sat him down in one of creaky old pews and told him to pray. Pray.
Pray that your father was a good enough man to get into Heaven.
The pastor, a kindly man named Rod, had found them not long after they arrived. He took Arlene into his arms as she broke down sobbing, barely able to tell him what had happened.
Rod turned to Naim and, with an arm held out, said “Come here, son.”
Naim just stared at him, not moving an inch.
Before long, a congregation had formed, and the news finally broke about Thomas Reid’s unfortunate death. The supe, who was actually based in Sydney, was never convicted and only received a suspension of his duties.
There, surrounded by all these people he hardly remembered the names of, is when Naim Reid felt his first pangs of hatred for superheroes.
The hate in his heart only grew after they settled into their new apartment in the dingy outskirts of New York City. His bedroom was directly facing a billboard advertising some new Vought product, the gleaming smile of Mr. Marathon taunting him each time he closed his eyes.
He lived like this for a whole year, letting his anger and vitriol for supes stir in his chest. His mother never spoke about her husband during that time, letting it hang heavy if a conversation started heading that way. Naim just had to listen with frustration as Arlene continuously refused and refused to mention Thomas’s name to any of her new friends.
When she did eventually say his name and that she was a widow, she’d chalk up his death to a car accident and not murder. It was on Naim’s sixteenth birthday, and he yelled at his mother for it. She couldn’t stop him as he stormed out the door, a gritted promise of “I’ll be back” the only respite she received.
Naim walked, then ran, straight into the heart of the city. The adrenaline from the fight with his mom mixed with the feeling of his aching feet coursed through his veins as the bright lights of Times Square hit his face for the first time. Arlene refused to ever bring him here, as she worried the worst would happen to them if they ever stepped one foot onto the sidewalks. For a second, he didn’t understand why his mother would never bring him here.
Then the adrenaline faded, and he became much too aware of how small he was compared to the towering skyscrapers.
He walked aimlessly for what felt like hours, trapped in a weird medium of wanting to leave and not wanting to go home. It felt like everyone he passed was staring at him, and the feeling of their eyes potentially on him caused his heartrate to quicken and his breathing to pick up.
He ducked into an alley when he couldn’t take it anymore, the only other body there being an older, dark-haired man with a cigarette between his lips. Naim had never smoked before, but at that moment he never wanted anything more.
He casually went to stand beside the man, his chest still rising and falling like a scared rabbit’s. The man glanced down, but Naim didn’t say anything. His mouth was suddenly dry and the words he wanted to say kept getting lodged in his throat.
Thankfully, it seemed as though the man understood what Naim was wanting, as he pulled out a crumpled box of cigarettes and lit one for the teen.
“Looks like you need one of these, son,” the man said, a heavy British accent in his voice.
“Th-thanks,” Naim replied, graciously taking the cigarette and putting it between his lips.
Immediately after the first inhale, he started hacking violently. Tears sprung to his eyes as the older man patted his shoulder with a chuckle. Even after he stopped coughing, though, the tears didn’t go away.
“Oh, don’t be embarrassed, lad. You wouldn’t be the first bloke to cough up a lung on their first ciggie,” the man said.
Naim wasn’t really listening. His father’s face was flashing in his mind, a disappointed look on it before it suddenly burst the same way it had when the supe killed him. It kept repeating, over and over until Naim doubled over and vomited the slice of cake he ate earlier.
“I’m sorry, I’m-” he sobbed, hot tears streaming down his face.
“Alright, son, let’s get you inside, come on,” the man worriedly said, grabbing Naim by the shoulders and bringing him inside the building they were next to. It was an Irish pub, packed with the night owls who drank away their day.
The rest of the night was blurry, and Naim honestly couldn’t say what he and the man spoke about over a glass of water and a pint.
All he remembers is that was the first time he met Billy Butcher and when he finally went home after all was said and done, he destroyed any ties to supes in the apartment. His mother had been furious with him, but he couldn’t find himself caring. He felt liberated.
A smile breaks onto his face at the memory as he drowns out Hughie and Starlight’s voices in his ear. M.M. and Butcher are watching them intently as they walk down one of the rows across from them. Naim only tunes in when he hears Starlight start talking to her mother.
“Remind me again why we need to be listening in on this? Last time I checked, Starlight doesn’t have the information about V,” M.M. says, a grimace on his face as he spits out a popcorn kernel to the side.
“It don’t hurt to make sure,” is how Butcher responds, menacing as always.
Naim starts to zone out again, letting the voices buzz together out as he picks at a loose string on the tablecloth in front of him. At some point, a fourth voice joins them, and the words spoken put a small pit in Naim’s stomach, causing him to finally start watching the interaction unfold.
“Stillwell just called, you’re off the teen roundtable,” the voice says to Starlight. “They’re having Seraph do it instead.”
At this, Butcher looks back at Naim, his expression unreadable with the dark sunglasses covering his eyes.
“What?” Naim asks, feeling the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.
“Change of plans, stick with M.M.”
Before Naim can protest or ask, Butcher is striding away, tapping away at his burner phone. People side-eye him as he goes, not bothering to move out of their way as he finally turns a corner out of sight.
The boy looks back at M.M., who’s also staring down the path Butcher took with a knit in his brow.
“I don’t know either, kid. This change of plan is news to me,” he says.
Naim gulps loudly and stares at the same spot where the string was sticking out. He has an awful, awful feeling about whatever’s coming.
☆☆☆
Ryan feels his eyes glaze over as he watches Ezekiel preach to the crowd. The white tank top he’s in scratches at his wings and a drop of sweat runs down his neck. The only proof that he’s mentally there is when he flinches at the sight of Ezekiel’s arms stretching impossibly outwards.
They put him in this ridiculous outfit and have him stand hidden in the wings for… what? So he can say that he did it? So they can keep up the facade of his unwavering faith to Ezekiel? To God?
He already knows they’re pushing him to join The Seven when he turns twenty-one, even if it’s three whole years from now. That frantic ginger woman - Ashley, right? - couldn’t stop thinking about it any time she was speaking to him. Part of him was tempted to scream at her that he knew already and that he wanted to go home. Please can I go home?
“Hey, Seraph, we need to get you at the roundtable tent so hair and makeup can get you ready,” Ashley says from behind him.
Before he turns around, he plasters on his PR-trained smile and tries not to look too hard into her eyes.
“Sounds good, lead the way.”
They weave through the throngs of people browsing the merchandise tents. Some occasionally look up and a sparkle of recognition glisten in their eyes as Ryan walks past them. He doesn’t dare look at any of them, even the ones that say his supe name and a greeting.
He’s focusing too hard on keeping his wings down and his mind clear, the beginnings of a migraine creeping in at the exertion. He suddenly regrets not grabbing the Tylenol from his mother before he was whisked away by a bunch of Vought associates.
Ashley doesn’t glance back at him once until they’ve arrived at the enclosed white tent at the edge of the festival grounds. It’s bigger than the other tents designated for panels and Q&As, although comparatively a lot smaller than the one where Ezekiel’s ‘Diamond Pass’ bullshit is taking place. He was deliberately avoiding glancing at it as they passed, but his mind got the better of him and he gave it a quick look before walking into the roundtable tent.
“Alright, remember,” Ashley says as the Vought hair and makeup crew get to work on Ryan, “you have twenty minutes for one-on-one time after the roundtable is over, then you need to be in the Diamond Pass tent so Ezekiel can publicly announce the disbandment of your partnership.”
Ryan falters a second, looking into the woman’s eyes.
Then Ezekiel gets to announce your internship with The Seven, she says in her mind, but I can’t tell him that because it’s supposed to be a surprise, Ashley.
She just smiles at him, and he can’t do anything other than smile back.
Hair and makeup leave when the pastor hosting the roundtable enters, a quick handshake to Ryan as he begins to help the crew setting up the chairs. Ryan knows he should help too, but his migraine is getting worse and he starts feeling sick to his stomach.
Eventually, the only two people in the tent are himself and the pastor, who’s rattling off in his ear about whatever.
“It’s a pleasure to be doing this with you, Seraph,” he says.
Ryan just gives him a quick smile before turning his head to look out the blurry window at the blobs of people walking by. He can’t bring himself to look back at the pastor, who’s still talking even though he was pretty much ignored. The strong temptation to look into the man’s eyes and know what he was actually thinking started to become much too overwhelming, and Ryan has to clench his fist to keep from thinking about it.
It feels like forever in the time before the roundtable starts. He can already see the line of teenagers outside one of the blurry windows and there’s so many. The sickness he had been feeling earlier starts hitting him in waves again and his head throbs painfully.
The pastor next to him looks down at his watch and sighs.
“I guess we should get started,” he says, standing up to open the tent flaps and greet the smiling faces. Immediately, though, all of them look at Ryan.
The teens file in, buzzing with excitement but trying to keep it low-key. A girl who’s only two years younger than him sits in the open seat to his left, a wide, bright smile on her face as she looks up at him.
He steels himself and returns the look, smiling as genuinely as he can. This is okay, he thinks, I can do okay.
However, that blanket of comfort is ripped off of him as he catches eyes with a dark-haired boy his age. Warmth spreads across his face as the boy, who visibly gulps and quickly looks away, sits down across from him.
He thinks I’m… He finds me…
If he finishes that thought, the grass in front of him will be covered in puke, and he might fly all the way back to Australia if it meant he’d never have to show his face again.
☆☆☆
A wave of dizziness and paranoia wash over Naim as he keeps his eyes glued to the ground. His burner phone feels like lava in the pocket of his shorts and the police report he was given keeps flashing in his mind.
When Butcher returned from what he called “retrieving information”, he crowded The Boys in close and pointedly spoke to Naim.
“You’re going to that teen roundtable Starlight was supposed to lead and you’re gonna ask for a little one-on-one time with that Seraph cunt,” the older man had said, an evil smirk on his face.
Naim suddenly felt hot as M.M. and Hughie began to protest the plan.
“No fuckin’ way, Butcher. I thought you told me the kid wouldn’t be doing any solo reconnaissance this time around,” M.M. said, holding his hands up as if it’d placate the other man.
“Right, what if something goes wrong? What if Seraph, I don’t know… attacks him or something?” Hughie added.
Naim didn’t hear them, his breathing quickening as he looked into Butcher’s face for any form of untruthfulness.
“Oh, he’ll be alright. After all, if it wasn’t for him, we would’ve been dead a good while ago,” Butcher had responded, the evil grin not faltering once.
M.M. looked at Butcher with disbelief and Hughie ran his hands through his hair in worry. The rest of that debriefing flashed by, Naim only feeling sicker and sicker as Butcher showed him what he’d be using to blackmail Seraph.
An old police report the supe had made against Ezekiel, describing in detail the things the gospeler had done to him when he was a kid.
Now, as Naim sits and half-listens to Seraph talk about his religious journey, he has to stop himself from getting up and running away.
He felt waves and waves of guilt coursing through him. Not only was he going to something so horrible against the supe, he had even found him attractive when he first laid eyes on him.
It was fitting how he ended up being an angel. His curly hair was light blond, cut into a perfect, not-ugly mullet and his eyes were the most ethereal shade of light blue. The tank top he was wearing - that Naim unfortunately realized was a copy of Ezekiel’s normal outfit - showed off his toned arms, the muscles involuntarily flexing here and there. For some reason, Naim imagined those arms holding him.
Seraph’s skin was pale, but it wasn’t a sickly pale that someone had to be concerned about - it was almost as if he was glowing. Another unsavory thought crossed Naim’s mind as he wondered what the supe would look like with bite marks all over him. Would his skin mottle with hues of purple and red? Would they last long?
Rethinking all of this again, Naim finally looks up at the supe. He’s deep into his story, not looking at anyone and using his hands to articulate his words.
And, oh god, Naim thinks. His hands are big.
A sudden flash of those hands touching Naim, grasping his face and jerking his cock are what causes him to snap his eyes back down to the grass. This is probably the worst place to be thinking things like this, and yet here he is, trying to discreetly adjust himself so no one notices the hard-on he’s sporting.
Thankfully, no one seems to be paying attention, and he has to fight the urge to slap himself out of it when his mind tries to pick back up the dirty thoughts it seems to just love thinking.
Are his wings sensitive? Could he cum from someone touching them alone? Does he use his powers in bed? How would that even work?
If Naim asked, could he be fucked in mid-air?
Applause jolts him out of his spiral, and he awkwardly joins in as the pastor next to Seraph speaks up.
“How wonderful was that, huh? God works in such mysterious ways. I mean, he’s graced us with the presence of an angel, after all,” he’s saying, a nice smile on his face.
Seraph is smiling as well, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. Naim freezes when he makes eye contact with him again.
When the pastor opens up for questions, almost every hand in the tent shoot up immediately. They’re mostly cut and dry, ones Naim can’t really bring himself to care about. Seraph answers each one with patience in his voice, making sure it seems like he really cares about each answer he gives.
After every other question or so, the supe will glance at Naim quickly, before giving his attention back to whoever had been called on to speak. It makes Naim nervous, sweat dripping down his back and soaking the inside of his hoodie.
What did Butcher say his powers were again? Naim asks himself. For once, he prays to God that his mind hasn’t been read this entire time. He realizes they’re down to the last two questions, and an intangible doom takes hold of his mind.
A girl a couple of chairs away is picked to ask a question.
“Um, Seraph-” she starts, but Seraph cuts her off with a chuckle. Naim already knows the sound is going to haunt his late-night thoughts.
“I’m so sorry for interrupting you, but I forgot to ask you all to call me Ryan while we gather here. I am not a superhero in your presence, I am just like you all,” he says, motioning for her to continue with her question.
Ryan, Ryan, Ryan, Naim repeats in his head. He’s tempted to whisper it, let it sit on his tongue to see how it tastes. He wants to see if it’d feel right to say.
One of the boys next to him raises his hand sheepishly, the final question of the roundtable. Naim gulps as he touches the burner phone over his pocket, reminding himself of why he’s here and what he’s about to do.
“Well, uh, I’ve been struggling a lot with something recently and I just wanted to ask if you- well, if you’ve ever had any homosexual thoughts?” The boy asks, his face going a deep shade of red.
The tent is quiet for a second, Ryan seemingly digesting the question and thinking about the response he should give. At first, he starts to speak, but he clamps his mouth shut and thinks some more. Naim feels himself hanging off the edge of his seat.
“First of all, I want to say that you shouldn’t feel ashamed for asking. If anything, I find it very courageous of you to ask and tackle your sins head on, not many people can say they’ve done that,” he starts. The group of teenagers all murmur in agreement, a fake support drifting among them.
“And second, to answer your question,” Ryan continues, and Naim feels his blood turn to ice when the supe makes direct eye contact with him. “No. I’ve never had homosexual desires.”
Oh my god, Naim is thinking, oh, I’m so fucked.
Naim stays frozen in his seat as the roundtable officially ends and everyone begins to leave. A couple of kids stay behind to speak one-on-one with either Ryan or the pastor, including the boy who asked the final question.
Eventually, he peels himself off the chair, his whole body feeling like rocks, as he heads toward Ryan and the boy, standing off to the side awkwardly while waiting his turn. Naim can’t bring himself to look up from the grass, his hood pulled tight around his head and feeling Ryan’s eyes on him.
He barely registers someone brushing by him as his mind flits from guilt and the burner phone to shame and blond hair, blue eyes, big hands-
“Can I help you?” Ryan asks, directly at Naim. His arms are folded across his chest and his biceps bulge.
Oh, God, Naim thinks, just strike me down now.
“Um, I- I wanted to speak with you?” Naim mutters, trying his hardest not to look into the supe’s face.
Ryan continues to stand there with his arms crossed, looking down at Naim and waiting for whatever could possibly come from his mouth. Naim takes a deep breath and takes out the burner phone from his pocket. Now or never, he tells himself.
“I haven’t got all day, mate, so if you want a picture then just-”
“Tell me everything you know about Compound V or I post the police report you made against Ezekiel to every social media site I know of.”
It’s Ryan’s turn to freeze now, staring at the dull screen held up to his face. Naim is looking him dead in the eye, trying to stave off the shame creeping on his skin. They stare at each other like that for a few seconds before Ryan shakes himself out of it and, with the fakest smile Naim has ever seen, turns to the pastor who is approaching them.
“This young man needs a lot of help, Father. Do you mind if we have the tent to ourselves?” he asks, slapping a stiff hand on Naim’s shoulder.
The pastor looks between the two boys, a slight show of confusion on his face before smiling and leaving with a nod.
Naim watches as the pastor’s blurry figure gets further away from the tent before he’s suddenly and violently pushed to the ground, a flaming sword held to his throat.
“Who the fuck are you?” Ryan seethes, the sword getting hotter as his anger rises. A drop of his spit lands on Naim’s cheek and he has to stop his body from shuddering.
“I-I really don’t want to post that report!” Naim stammers, struggling against Ryan’s grip. “I just need to kn-know about Compound V, tha-that’s it.”
Ryan pushed his sword forward ever so slightly. “I don’t think I believe you.”
“I-I’m deadset, mate, I promise! Just tell me about Compound V-V and I’ll be out of your hair.”
The supe stares down at him, thinking. Naim can see the gears turning in his head and for a second, he thinks this might work.
“And why do you need to know about it?” Ryan asks finally, keeping the sword close to Naim’s throat. The sound of skin singeing and the smell of flesh burning begins to take over the tent as the flame grows a bit.
“I-I just do! Please, don’t hurt me,” Naim whimpers, tears rolling down his cheeks.
Ryan doesn’t say anything for a moment. Naim squeezes his eyes shut, waiting for the supe to thrust the sword forward and end him. Fortunately though, the weight comes off his body and Naim cracks an eye open in time to watch the sword disappear into Ryan’s chest.
The younger boy gets up on shaky legs, breathing hard and fast. Ryan just looks at him.
“Here is what’s going to happen,” Ryan starts, staring the Naim down with an ice cold glare. “You will walk out of this tent knowing nothing, and I will leave this shitty event knowing everything. You will not post that report, because if you do, I will find you and I will fucking kill you. You will not tell any of this to those men you work for, and you will never ever try to speak to me again. Do you understand me?”
Naim doesn’t answer as he rubs the slightly burnt skin on his neck. He should probably just cut his losses and get out of there while he still had a head on his shoulders, but the thought of Butcher’s disappointed face flashes by and Naim stupidly tries to regain his hold on the situation.
“So, you can tell me about-”
He’s right back on the ground again, but this time there is no flaming sword licking at his skin… Just Ryan’s hands squeezing his throat. Naim doesn’t even try to fight him off.
“I don’t think I made myself clear, huh? Let me tell you something, Naim, there’s a difference between me and you. I will live like a fucking king for the rest of my life, having the knowledge of a million men because I’ll know what they’re all thinking. I’m going to go home and completely forget about you, even if I fucking kill you right here, because you are nothing.
”And you, pathetic little you, will live life like a flea. Sitting in bed in that shitty fucking apartment with that equally pathetic woman, jerking off to the very idea of me because I know this will haunt you, just like all the other things in your life you’ve never let go of. You are never going to get revenge for your father and he’ll look down on you with so much shame that it kills him a second time.”
Ryan finally lets go of Naim’s throat and stands back up, looking down at him with an awful sneer.
“Now, do you understand me?” he grits. Naim can’t do anything but nod.
He slowly gets up from the grass as Ryan pushes past him to walk out of the tent.
“And Naim?” the supe says, looking back, “I saw what you were thinking when I was speaking. I hope you learn a thing or two while you’re here.”
With those parting words sitting heavy in his stomach, Naim is left completely alone in the tent.
☆☆☆
Ashley is yelling after him when Ryan stomps by, pure rage and anger coursing through his body. He’s never felt such hatred in his life, and he’s also never felt such betrayal.
When that boy had held up the police report his parents assured him was buried and gone, he felt such burning outrage that he had almost forgotten where he was. He should’ve killed that pest even if it meant losing everything, because now he knows just how weak Ryan once was.
He doesn’t realize that he’s storming right up to his parents and the booth they set up for him until he’s standing in front of his own smiling face.
“Hi, love, how was the roundtable?” his mother cheerfully asks before actually looking at her son. His father looks up too, and their expressions are eerily similar.
“You said it was gone,” Ryan hissed, ignoring the people who walked by with turned heads.
His parents look confused and downright terrified. He’s staring into their eyes to get a read of what they’re thinking.
They really have no clue what he’s talking about.
“Son, calm down, yeah? You sound as cross as a frog in a sock,” his father whispers, also taking notice of the people trying to eavesdrop nearby. “Let’s just sit down and talk-”
“You said you had the report erased, so why did I just have someone ask me about it?” Ryan interrupts, angry tears prick at his eyes.
Both of his parents go pale as they stare at their son in blank horror. Their hearts are beating so fast Ryan can see the pulsing through their skin.
He only gets angrier as their thoughts are swirling around, most notably How does he know? Who told him?
“Lovey, please don’t-” his mother tries. The burning outrage he felt earlier comes back in full force, he almost staggers.
A tear falls down his cheek as his words mix with pleading, “Did you or did you not have the report erased?”
His body is shaking almost violently at this point, and his parents are trembling so bad he almost feels guilty for doing this. But he needs to know. He needs to understand how Butcher got access to the report.
His parents keep looking at each other dumbly, like they’re trying to communicate via telepathy. Memories of his childhood start to bubble up and he has to tamp them down before he does something he regrets.
“Ryan-” one of them says, but he can’t tell which.
“Did you or did you not have the report erased?” he repeats with gritted teeth, this time screaming it as if it’ll make them answer him. A crowd has formed now, whispering among themselves at the display of anger in front of them.
Finally, his mother looks back at him, straight into his eyes.
We just wanted to protect you.
More tears fall from his eyes as he steps back in disbelief. He doesn’t know what to say, so he’s just shaking his head and hoping whatever he’s trying to convey makes sense.
Ryan looks around at the people watching, and they cower away as if he was going to hurt them.
This is his fault, this is Naim’s fault, he tells himself. I was so stupid to think that he…
Like before, if he finishes that thought, he’s going to be sick.
With one last look at his parents - and a glance at a cardboard cutout of Ezekiel to his left - he shoots into the air as fast as his wings allow him, and zips away back toward the city.
☆☆☆
Surprisingly, Hughie had ended up successfully getting the intel about Compound V after Naim’s fuck up.
He had braced himself for Butcher’s anger, telling him in the most vague language possible about what happened, Seraph’s threat still fresh on his mind. He felt like a dog with its tail tucked in between its legs, even when Butcher laughed and patted his shoulder and told him that Hughie got it handled.
So, now here he was with M.M. and Butcher at the closest hospital where Compound V had been sent, stalking behind a night nurse and snagging her I.D. badge.
Naim doesn’t listen when Butcher snarkily refuses to answer M.M.’s question of where he had snuck off to after Hughie went to speak to Ezekiel, because he probably already knew the answer.
Way back when The Boys disbanded the first time around, Butcher had brought Naim to meet a woman named Rachel Saunders. She wasn’t pleased to see Butcher, and was even less pleased to see a teenager with him.
“You’re going to get him killed,” she stated bluntly.
Butcher hadn’t said anything back to her before telling Naim to sit in the living room while they talked. Thirty minutes later, they were already leaving and Butcher was explaining himself.
“That was my wife’s sister,” he said, not taking his eyes off the road in front of him. “I visit her sometimes when my head’s all up in the clouds, even if she don’t like it when I do.”
Naim hadn’t asked any questions, because there was the unmistakable energy of this is me opening up to you, which I don’t ever do and who was he to mess that up?
The smell of disinfectant was stinging his nose, and Naim was starting to get a headache from the beaming fluorescent lights. They turn a corner and head down a long corridor leading into the NICU when Butcher’s phone rings. It’s Frenchie, calling to let them know he’s been burned somehow.
Both M.M. and Naim look at Butcher with concern as he presses Frenchie for more information, eventually telling her to leave the girl they had found in the basement of that noodle shop behind. He looks at his two teammates and sullenly confirms what they already know.
It won’t be long before they get burned too.
Butcher uses the swiped I.D. badge to enter the NICU, M.M. and Naim following close behind with the latter making sure they aren’t being followed and the doors behind them are shut quietly.
The three split up when they walk into the heart of the room, carefully moving around so as to not bump into the transparent cribs lined up. Each of them are lit up to offer a clear view at the infants and Naim can’t help but smile as he looks down at one of the sleeping babies.
Butcher stops at a crib near the far wall, and M.M. and Naim come up to see what he’s found.
“Jackpot,” he whispers, and the bright blue liquid he’s looking at leaves no question as to what it is.
He traces the tube with his hand, stopping when it starts inside the-
Wait. It leads inside the crib.
With horror, the three of them look down at the infant as the realization hits them.
“Oh my god,” Butcher mutters.
They jump back when two pulsing lines of pure energy shoot from the baby’s eyes. Naim’s ears start to ring as he continues to stare down at the infant, only looking up at Butcher and M.M. when Butcher voices his thoughts.
“They aren’t chosen… these cunts are made in a fuckin’ lab.”
Oh god, oh fuck, Naim thinks, this- this is…
M.M. sets a hand on his shoulder, effectively snapping him out of his thoughts.
“You okay, kid? You need some air?” he asks, his brows knitted in worry.
Naim looks over at Butcher, who’s grabbing a blood sample tube and syringe to grab a sample of the V.
“No… no,” he mutters, looking at the ground. “Why is this…”
“Breathe, kid, look at me. We’ll get out of here as soon as we get the sample, alright? I just need you to relax until then, okay?” M.M. says, placing his other hand on Naim’s other shoulder and squeezing them.
Naim doesn’t try to speak again, just looking up at the older man and nodding.
Then the door is opening and a white-hot pain is blooming in his shoulder where M.M.’s hands were just at. Butcher drags him behind a wall as M.M. trades fire with the three agents that have burst into the room. Naim touches the spot where the pain starts becoming unbearable and blood coats his palms when he looks.
“Don’t look at it, son, it’ll only make it worse,” Butcher says to him, but he can’t really hear him all that well. His eyes go cross and his vision goes black at the edges.
He must’ve gone unconscious for a second because, when he blinks, the agents are all dead and M.M. is getting ready to pick him up from his spot on the ground.
“Hey, kid, I need you to keep those eyes open for me, yeah? Can you hear me?” he asks.
Naim tries to respond, but it comes out as a grunt as his eyes start getting heavy again.
“Butcher, we need to get the kid patched up. He ain’t looking too good right now.”
Butcher looks down at Naim, who’s trying so desperately to keep his eyes open. They’re unfocused and bleary and he’s groaning in pain.
“Good thing we’re in a hospital then, yeah?” Butcher responds, his lips twitching in a smile.
M.M. just stares at him.
Naim feels himself being picked up and thinks he can hear Butcher saying something to someone else in the room. Everything hurts so much; his body and his mind and his soul and-
He blacks out again, letting the darkness surround him like a cloud.