Translucent had been missing for more than twenty-four hours when Vought finally stopped treating it like a communication issue.
Search teams were already spread across the city, security departments digging through footage while Ashley tried to stop the situation from turning into a public disaster.
Homelander stayed quiet through all of it.
That silence alone kept everyone tense.
Then The Deep found something beneath the harbor.
A zinc-lined box resting underwater near the docks.
He pulled it up fast and brought it onto a private dock away from cameras while Vought security locked the entire area down.
Homelander arrived first.
The moment the lid opened, the smell got worse.
Inside the box, barely visible beneath the shifting distortion of his own skin, was Translucent’s corpse curled against the metal interior.
Dead.
Even after death his body still bent light strangely enough to remain partially invisible.
Then Homelander’s eyes moved upward.
Written across the inside top panel of the box were the words—
Coming for you.
***
Outside a Juvenile Detention Center, the van sat parked near the curb while Butcher had gone inside saying he needed to "have a word with an old friend."
Which, knowing Butcher, could mean anything from a conversation to blackmail.
In the back seat, Mark was asleep, stretched awkwardly against the side of the van like someone who had stopped caring about comfort several disasters ago.
Frenchie sat in the driver’s seat smoking quietly until his expression suddenly shifted.
"...Mon dieu."
He sniffed the air once.
Then again.
"What the hell is that smell?" he muttered. "It smells like something died."
He immediately started checking around the van, looking for old food or trash stuffed somewhere under the seats.
But the smell kept getting stronger.
And it was coming from the back.
Hughie slowly leaned away from Mark while covering his nose.
Frenchie turned around fully and stared at him in disbelief.
"Wait," he said slowly. "That is you?"
Mark cracked one eye open tiredly.
"When was the last time you bathed?" Frenchie asked.
Mark lifted a hand weakly and started counting on his fingers.
"One... two... three..."
He stopped at four.
Frenchie looked genuinely disturbed.
"Four days?" he said. "And you are still wearing the same clothes?"
Mark shrugged from the back seat.
"Well, yeah," he said. "I don’t exactly have spare outfits lying around."
"Or you are short on cash?" Frenchie asked, staring at him with growing concern. At this point he was starting to wonder what kind of stray Butcher had dragged into their mess.
The guy didn’t own extra clothes, hadn’t bathed in four days, and slept in the back of a van like a raccoon.
Mark opened his eyes slightly.
"No," he corrected. "Low on cash would imply I still have some. I’m at absolute zero."
Frenchie blinked once.
"...Impressive."
Hughie, who had been quietly suffering beside the smell this entire time, finally spoke up.
"Actually," he said carefully, "I should probably go home too. I need to get some clothes."
He hesitated before adding the important part.
"Can I leave and come back?"
Frenchie immediately shook his head.
"Non," he said. "Absolutely not."
Hughie stared at him. "What?"
"You disappear the second Butcher leaves, he comes back and kills me first," Frenchie replied. "I am not taking that risk for your laundry."
"I’m not going to run," Hughie said.
Frenchie gave him a look that clearly said everyone says that before running.
"You are already involved now," he continued. "One of The Seven is dead. You do not get normal life privileges anymore."
Hughie slumped back into his seat with a frustrated exhale.
"I seriously feel like a hostage."
Mark spoke without opening his eyes.
"You technically are," he muttered. "Just with extra steps."
Frenchie pinched his nose dramatically before turning around in the driver’s seat.
"Mon dieu, are you planning to do something about this smell or do we all suffer together now?"
Mark cracked an eye open from the back seat. "I’ll ask Butcher for money when he comes back. Buy clothes. Maybe soap too if the organization budget allows it."
Frenchie let out a sharp laugh.
"Billy Butcher? Money?" He pointed a cigarette at him like the idea itself was offensive. "My friend, this man owes me forty thousand dollars. Four-zero. If he had money, I would already have taken it."
Hughie looked between them. "Wait, seriously?"
"Yes, seriously," Frenchie said. "That man lives entirely on cigarettes, blackmail, and unresolved trauma."
Then he looked back at Mark again, still baffled.
"So what were you before Butcher pulled you into this disaster?" he asked. "Because right now you look like homeless Wolverine."
Mark stared at the roof of the van for a second.
"I was surviving."
Frenchie blinked slowly.
"If you really want to know," Mark said, "I used to be a writer."
Hughie looked surprised immediately. "Seriously?"
"Yeah," Mark replied. "Didn’t exactly make it big though."
Frenchie glanced at him through the mirror, confused more than anything now.
"You were a writer?" he asked. "Then how did you end up here?"
Mark stared at the ceiling of the van for a second before shrugging.
"I failed at that," he said. "So now I’m this instead."
Frenchie narrowed his eyes. "That explains absolutely nothing."
"Honestly,"
***
A/N: Advanced Chapters are available on Patreon.
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