"You thought I wouldn't find this thing?"
The voice came from the empty air in front of him. Hughie thought he was hallucinating, but the floating listening device he supposedly planted was very much real.
An invisible hand reached out, snagging the employee ID around Hughie's neck and lifting it.
"Hughie."
Suddenly, a powerful hand grabbed his head and slammed his face against the counter glass. Crack. Then the invisible force lifted him up like he weighed nothing and threw him against the floor.
"You pussy, I followed you from the fucking tower."
Hughie was yanked up again, his feet dangling.
"No, no, no"
He was thrown like a ragdoll against the store front glass. The frame groaned. Hughie slumped, his vision blurry.
"Whos that guy you were with? In the car? WHO WAS HE? DID HE PUT YOU UP TO THIS?"
"I DONT KNOW! HE WAS JUST SOME UBER DRIVER!"
"DONT GIVE ME THAT BULLSHIT!"
The voice drifted toward the TV section. Hughie watched, paralyzed, as a flat-screen was ripped from its stand. It hovered in mid-air, tilting toward him.
"You think I'm some kind of idiot? Why did you plant the bug, huh?"
"Please, no..."
"We are the Seven. Earth's most mighty champions. Protectors of the innocents, motherfucker!"
The storefront exploded.
Glass turned into dust and a black car roared into the shop. It crashed through the aisles, crushing speakers and shelves. Translucent was caught right in the middle.
There was a heavy thud as the front slammed into the empty air. The car rammed him back, pinning the invisible man against the shelves and flying him all the way to the back wall.
BAM.
The wall cracked. Plaster and dust showered down as the car smashed him into the bricks. The tires screeched on the floor for one last second before the engine cut out.
The door swung open and butcher stepped out with crowbar in his hand. He looked at the wreckage and grinned.
"Sorry for the mess, but you should fuck off, Hughie," Butcher said, his eyes never leaving the wreckage.
Hughie was still frozen, shaken to the core.
"Hughie, run!" Butcher barked. He turned back to the space where the car had pinned the air against the brick. "Well, well, well... if it ain't the invisible cunt."
He said as he looked at the space where Translucent crashed. He raised his crowbar and slammed it, expecting to hit something; the only thing it did hit was the wall, or what remained of it.
Translucent was already up. A car crash that would have turned a human into jelly had barely even staggered him. His carbon skin had soaked up the impact like it was nothing.
Before Butcher could pull the bar back, a heavy, invisible foot slammed into his ribs.
Butcher flew to the side, sliding across the floor and smashing into a rack of DVDs. The crowbar clattered away.
Hughie ran to the emergency exit. His heart was a frantic against his body, his ribs, his lungs burning with the pain and the taste of his own blood. All he could think about was the police.
Hughie slammed his weight against the door, and it swung open. But in that moment, hearing the sounds of the struggle behind him.
The image of A-Train's face as he blurred through Robin, the casual, uncaring way he joked about how she was turned into a red mist flashed in his mind.
He let the door swing and turned back toward the fight, his hands trembling as he went back.
Unknown to him, a hand caught the door before it could click shut.
As I walked in. I saw Hughie heading back into the store and felt a flicker of doubt. This invisible guy was powerful.
He'd been smashed by a human vehicle and survived without a scratch. He was powerful enough to toss the other humans around.
As I walked deeper inside, he saw a transparent figure. The blood smeared across his body making his transparency useless. He was a floating, red-stained shape.
His back was turned to Aldrich. The invisible Supe stood over the wreckage, his blood-smeared form looming over the other human, who was pinned to the floor.
Translucent held Butcher's own crowbar, ready to deliver a killing blow.
Hughie was on all fours for some reason, crawling toward the wall.
"So, who are you? A fucking spy for who, huh? You're going to fucking tell me, or I'm going to smash your fucking scalp off. Who the fuck are you?"
Butcher saw me coming first, then Hughie. I threw a clumsy punch straight into the invisible Supe's neck.
The impact, fueled by the Deep's strength, pushed the Supe forward a couple of steps towards butcher, but that was it. It didn't do anything else.
"Oh, what the fuck?" the air groaned
The red, blood-smeared figure turned toward me. He looked furious.
It seemed I had miscalculated.
"Let's talk this through," I said, raising my hands in a placating gesture.
A blood-smeared fist was hurled toward my face, and I failed to react in time. My head snapped back from the blow, but I stayed on my feet.
While my strength was ineffective against him, his own strength wasn't on par with his defense.
It put us in an awkward standstill.
Translucent felt a cold spike of alarm. Panic started to set in. This wasn't just a botched bugging; it was a conspiracy.
First the bugging, then the lunatic with the car, and now a Supe that definitely wasn't on the Vought payroll. This was deep.
Translucent looked at the kid he man handled earlier. He needed an out. So he softened his voice, trying to sound like the "hero" the public saw on TV.
"Kid," Translucent said. "Whatever they told you, whatever they're paying you, you don't have to do this. You're one of us. You're a Supe. You should be helping me capture these terrorists and taking them back to the Tower."
He moved a step closer, projecting that "Supe" warmth.
"You help me out, and you'll be a hero. Vought takes care of its own, kid. We look out for each other. You don't belong in the dirt with these animals. Come with me and we'll get you fixed up."
Butcher was alarmed he looked at Hughie and he saw him holding a high voltage cable.
"Hey, you cunt!" Butcher shouted, and Translucent, alarmed, turned to him. "I'll tell you who you are, you fucking moron. Translucent doesn't even mean invisible; it means semi-transparent."
Hughie attempted to touch the cable to Translucent, but it was too short. After trying and failing, Translucent turned to look to see what Butcher was looking at.
Butcher smiled and kicked him back. He was inches away from the cable, but he was far too alarmed by Aldrich and Butcher. Aldrich, catching on, pushed him further.
Hughie let out a high-pitched, panicked scream, his face twisted in horror as the current surged through the wire.
Translucent didn't make a sound. His jaw slammed shut, and his entire body arched into a stiff, vibrating board. The electricity hummed through his carbon skin, turning him into a flickering, yellow-white silhouette.
He collapsed into the floor with a heavy thud, The crowbar slipped from his locked fingers, clattering against the floor with a sharp, hollow ring that echoed through the ruined shop.
Butcher looked over the smoking, unconscious Supe, breathing hard. He turned to look at the kid who had just tanked a hit from a member of the Seven, his eyes narrowed in suspicion.
"Right then," Butcher started, his voice a low growl. "Who the hell are"
He was cut off by the sound of retching.
Aldrich doubled over, his body finally finishing the "refining" process of Great Wide Wonder's tainted blood. He vomited a green, oily sludge onto the floor, the chemical filth and human impurities finally expelled.
Butcher took a step back, his face twisting in disgust. "Well. That's one way to say 'hello,' I suppose."