Ivan's voice had that devil quality, thick with temptation, like it wanted to drag a man straight into the pit.
"I should have mentioned Temporary Compound V to you already, non?" As he spoke, Ivan pulled four lime-green vials from his pocket and set them on the coffee table.
"They give you powers for a short window. No leftover damage."
Hughie's eyes tracked every move. He stared at the Temporary Compound V on the table. After a stretch of silence, his voice came out a little raw. "Take that shit away. I don't need it. Nobody on The Boys needs it."
"You sure about that?" Ivan locked onto Hughie's eyes. A thin smile sat on his face.
A flash of struggle crossed Hughie's eyes, but he held the line. Pies do not fall out of the sky for free, and if one does, there is a good chance it is packed with poison.
On top of that, he really did not want more contact with the man in front of him.
Danger leaked out of every pore on the guy.
"You know what they say? The eyes are the window to the soul. And in yours I see the hunger for power. So tell me, why fight it?" Seeing Hughie still not budging, Ivan kept smiling. "Power itself is not evil. What it is depends on who uses it. Same as that pistol you stuffed in the sofa.
You can rob with it. You can kill with it. Or you can stop a crime before it happens. Powers work the same way. Good or bad is down to the man holding them."
When Ivan finished, the struggle on Hughie's face got worse. He had to admit the mysterious man was right. Having powers was not automatically a bad thing.
Unlike Butcher, who treated every supe like a monster, Hughie had Starlight in his head. He did not reject powers. He did not think they would rot his mind. If he stayed strong inside, he could handle them and use them right.
"So, ehm, Mysterious guy. What's the price of that power?"
Hughie asked it low.
Ivan smiled when he saw Hughie stop wobbling.
Truth was, powers were rotten at the root, especially for ordinary people.
Same as a gun. Before you own one, you can stay calm and think. After you own one, most people cannot keep the impulse down.
Give a man power and the rotten part of him blows up fast.
Unless his self-control is iron.
"I am coming on your operation. I go to Russia with you." Ivan's plan was simple. Get in before Soldier Boy woke up, parse his power, and fuse it.
Compared to Homelander, Soldier Boy was the only one who could actually threaten him.
Soldier Boy's power was special. He could strip other supes of their powers. That included Ivan.
Ivan figured if Soldier Boy's chest blast hit him, he would lose most of what he had now, including his super skin and his superhuman constitution.
That did not mean he would turn into a regular man. Even without powers his strength still sat at superhero level. He could still go a round with Homelander. Winning was a long shot, but walking away alive should not be a problem.
"How much do you actually know about Soldier Boy? Why do you want him?" Hughie asked.
"Go tell Butcher and the rest. I leave the vials here. Use them or don't, I don't care. But I need to be clear…"
Ivan stood and stepped in front of Hughie.
His eyes went ice-cold in a second.
"This is not me asking your permission. This is me telling you. You move without me, I guarantee you and your father end up a smear of meat on the floor."
Before he left, Ivan patted Hughie's shoulder.
Click.
The door shut.
"Ouch.."
A sharp pain tore through Hughie's shoulder. He turned his head and looked. A fleshy tendril, like a plant vine made of meat, had punched out of his skin and was waving in the air.
"Shit!" Hughie's face went ugly. He grabbed for it, tried to rip it off.
The next second, under his horrified stare, the tendril dove back into his shoulder.
Riiip! Hughie tore his shirt open. What made his skin crawl was that the filthy thing moved under his skin like it had a mind of its own, sliding around, like it could punch into his heart any second and finish him.
"Shit! Shit! Shit!" Hughie spat it three times in a row.
He ran to the kitchen, snatched a fruit knife, and set the point against his own shoulder.
Half a minute later his hand dropped. His face went slack. He did not have the guts. He did not have the guts to peel his own skin and meat and dig that thing out.
"Power, huh?" That feeling of his life being held hostage made Hughie want power so bad it hurt.
His eyes went to the lime-green vials on the table. Before he knew what he was doing, he walked toward the coffee table.
"Cold." The word slipped out of him the second his hand closed around the bottle.
Right then he heard the door.
"Hughie, I forgot to tell you. I had an interview today with the American Superhero show, so I got back late. And I have to say, Courtney Fortney really is the complete bitch people say she is. That bitch asked about my sex life on camera. I swear to God I wanted to kill her."
Starlight kept bitching as she headed for the bathroom. When she came out she had changed into regular clothes.
That was when she finally saw Hughie looked wrong.
She frowned. "You look like you just got fired. What happened?"
"Wait. Where did you get this?" Sharp-eyed Starlight locked onto the Temporary Compound V on the table. The vials still had labels. They came from a Vought lab.
"The mysterious man was just here."
Hughie sagged back against the sofa, wiped out.
"The mysterious man?!"
Starlight went tight in a second.
"You're saying he gave you this?" She picked up one of the lime-green vials. "He wants you to inject this shit?"
"Pretty much." Hughie let out a breath. He was out of options.
He bent over the Temporary Compound V in front of him and muttered, "You think this stuff would give me power that actually matters?"
"That stuff will only bring you bad luck!"
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Read 12 Advance Chapters—P@t- Captain69