Tying up loose ends

Hughie hung up and gripped his phone tightly, his palms slick with sweat.

Excitement, nerves, and a tremor at being entrusted with such an important task made his heart pound.

He paced back and forth, waiting anxiously, every second feeling as long as a century.

Several dozen minutes later, someone roughly pulled open the underground warehouse's iron door from outside. Butcher walked in first, followed by a grim-faced Mother's Milk and Frenchie, who looked exhausted and worried.

In Frenchie's arms lay an unconscious black-haired girl: Kimiko.

"Lock her in the cage. Use the strongest alloy locks." Butcher's voice was cold, tinged with the fatigue of a completed mission.

Together, they shut the still-unconscious Kimiko inside a specially made metal cage. As Frenchie fastened the final lock, his movements betrayed hesitation and reluctance.

"Butcher, do we really have to..."

"Shut up, Frenchie," Butcher cut him off. "You saw what happened to those gangsters. She's a killing weapon, not your pet."

Seeing that the two were about to argue again, Hughie, who could no longer contain himself, rushed forward, grabbed Butcher's arm, and dragged him outside.

"Butcher! I have something important to tell you!" Hughie lowered his voice, but he couldn't hide his excitement.

Butcher impatiently shook off his hand. "What's more important than a supe who could wake up any second and tear us apart?"

"Compound V!" Hughie said urgently. "Lucian got his hands on it! And... and it's not a stimulant at all!"

Butcher frowned, fixing Hughie with a sharp stare.

Hughie swallowed and repeated what Lucian had said over the phone, word for word. "Lucian said its main effect is giving an ordinary person superpowers! Every one of Vought's superheroes was made with it!"

"What?"

The impatience on Butcher's face vanished instantly, replaced by astonishment mingled with shock and fervor.

He seized Hughie by the collar and all but shouted, "Are you sure? Is that really what he said?"

"Absolutely!"

Butcher released him, his eyes flickering intensely.

He wasn't a fool. He instantly understood what this meant.

If this was true, it would be their deadliest weapon against Vought and all those "superheroes"! Evidence! Evidence that could drag Vought off its pedestal and smash it to pieces!

"Fuck..." he muttered, turning to head back inside. "Frenchie! Mother's Milk! Get over here!"

"Wait!" Hughie hurriedly stopped him.

"Wait for what?" Butcher glared at him.

"Lucian said..." Hughie was somewhat intimidated by Butcher's stare, but he mustered his courage. "He said things are complicated right now, and he can't trust anyone. He only wants the two of us to come. Just us."

He narrowed his eyes, studying the still somewhat green young man before him, seemingly weighing the truth of those words and their hidden meaning.

He only trusts the two of us?

A fucking supe says he trusts me? Butcher sneered inwardly. Sounds more like a trap.

Yet he couldn't resist the temptation. The truth about Compound V, along with a sample-the bait was too enticing, enough for him to risk anything.

He considered it for a few seconds, weighing the pros and cons. In the end, his desire for revenge drove him to a decision.

"Fine. Just us."

He turned to his equipment bag and discreetly took out a coin-sized GPS tracker and a voice recorder disguised as a pen, slipping them into his pocket.

Whatever game Lucian wanted to play, he needed a backup plan.

"Let's go," Butcher told Hughie, then called into the room, "Watch the girl. We're heading out!"

Hughie immediately followed. As soon as he got into the car, he sent Lucian a text: [We're on our way. ETA five hours.]

The instant the message arrived, Lucian stood up inside the cabin and brushed the dust off his clothes.

Five hours? Plenty of time.

The thermonuclear engine inside him started up. He became a blur, shooting into the sky and flying at high speed toward Hughie and the others' base.

A little over ten minutes later, he was hovering above the underground warehouse disguised as an abandoned factory.

He activated his super senses, and every sound within the warehouse reached his ears clearly.

"...I told you, she's just a victim! We can't treat her like a monster!" Frenchie's voice was angry and pleading.

"She killed people, Frenchie! She nearly killed you too!" Mother's Milk's voice was as steady as ever, but carried an uncompromising firmness. "Until we figure out exactly what she is, she stays in the cage."

The argument continued.

Lucian had no interest in listening to their debate.

His figure vanished from the air. A second later, he appeared inside the warehouse like a ghost.

Super speed activated!

Mother's Milk and Frenchie were still arguing. Before they could even make out what was in front of them, they felt an irresistible force strike their necks. Their vision went black, and both slumped to the floor.

Lucian gently lowered them to the ground, one in each hand.

[Mind control: LV3. Basic hypnosis]

With that done, he walked into the warehouse's inner room and saw the black-haired girl confined within a metal cage by layers of chains.

Kimiko.

She was still unconscious, her brows tightly furrowed, seemingly caught in a nightmare.

Lucian gently rested his palm against her forehead.

A cold sensation met his touch.

[Mind control] activated.

He neither probed nor deleted her memories. That would too easily agitate her mind in its current state. Instead, he carefully implanted an exceptionally clear "revelation" deep in her subconscious.

"Queens, Locke Street, the motel at 47-18... Go there, alone... There's information about your younger brother Kenji..."

At the same time as he touched her, system notifications lit up across his retinas.

[Superpowered target detected...]

[Superpower: LV5. Super Healing]

[Superpower: LV2. Super physique]

[Would you like to Copy?]

Lucian glanced at the unconscious Frenchie and abandoned the idea of copying it now.

No need. Frenchie's concern for Kimiko borders on obsession. He'll soon find a way to let her out, and I'll have plenty of opportunities then. Acting now would only spoil things if I left any traces.

His gaze shifted to Mother's Milk and Frenchie, who lay on the floor.

Next came tying up loose ends.

He crouched down and placed a hand on each man's head.

[Mind control] activated again.

This time, it was memory deletion and implantation.

He precisely located the portion of Frenchie's memory concerning his involvement in dealing with Translucent and erased it completely.

Then he implanted an entirely new, fabricated memory.

In the new memory, only Butcher, Hughie, and Frenchie had dealt with Translucent from beginning to end. Mother's Milk had merely heard Butcher mention a mysterious helper afterward, but had never met him.

With everything done, he restored the scene to its original state, as though he had never appeared.

He glanced at Kimiko in the cage, then turned and left without a sound.

Next stop: Locke Street, Queens.

It was a rundown motel that required no identification. He rented a room for a month, then installed a camera in a concealed corner.

The "stage" he had prepared for Kimiko was now set.

Only after finishing all this did he fly unhurriedly back to the woods where he had arranged to meet Hughie and Butcher.

He returned to the cabin and waited quietly for that car, carrying suspicion and hope, to drive into the trap he had laid.