Chapter Text
"Please." John's voice trembled right along with his body, especially his hands which were holding the phone. "I'm begging you... please!"
"No."
Beeps. That was William Butcher hanging up on him.
"Fuck!" John hurled the phone at the wall, but instead of it breaking the wall like he'd expect, it just bounces off.
John wailed from the feeling of powerlessness.
When he and Maeve shielded the rest of Vought Tower from the explosion, they woke up a month later in the hospital - "practically unharmed". That's what Maeve called it, and she was left without an eye because of him, but he'd rather have lost an eye than his damn superpowers. No super sense of smell, no super hearing, no flight. No strength. None of it.
"Really had to play the hero, huh?" Homelander grumbled from the mirror. "Didn't I tell you..."
John threw a glare at him, but nothing happened. He hit the mirror with his fist, and a hellish bolt of pain ran down his arm, but the mirror was finally cracked. The mocking look was still visible through the cracked surface, though.
"Was your son really worth it?"
John picked up his old suit from the floor — he had been trying to put it on earlier — untwisted it and scraped it over the mirror using what turned out to be pretty heavy eagle epaulets. Again and again. Until there were only shards of the mirror on the floor. He fell right on top of them.
"You have about a month to decide how we will be presenting your fate to the general public."
Maeve immediately chose "death." She had no second thoughts.
"To hell with superpowers. I'll finally start living a normal life — where do I sign the papers to get Vought to fuck off?"
How could she...
Vile, stupid Maeve. Vile, stupid hospital. Vile, stupid company. He replayed the scene of his coming out of the coma over and over again in his head.
"Where's Ryan? Where the hell is my son?"
“While you were in a coma, William Butcher provided all the documents about his marriage to Becca Butcher. Which makes him Ryan Butcher's sole guardian. You'll be able to see Ryan only by arranging it with him."
"I'm fucking Homelander."
"Unfortunately, you've lost your powers. Vought kindly gives you the choice of how to divulge this to the public. Should you choose "death", you'll lose everything you have with "Vought". You'll still have your bank account, but access to your apartment and other rooms in the tower, your uniforms, name, trademark, and everything else will be revoked. Your second option is cooperation. You won't lose access to anything, but you will have to help us promote V24."
"So would I be able to use V24 every day until I die?"
"Certainly… but death occurs sometime after the third, fourth, or fifth use."
"Fuck! How long do I have to decide?"
"A month."
"And what about the rest of the supes?"
"They're in the process of being deactivated. We're folding the whole project due to the extreme risk demonstrated by the Soldier Boy incident. We have the right to take away the abilities that we bestowed in the first place – that's described in the legal papers you signed annually. And that's the news, Homelander. Or, if you don't want to cooperate, John."
Homelander scooped up the mirror shards and squeezed them in his hand. Pain shot through his arm, sharper than ever, but still not enough to distract him. He burst into tears – lying naked among the broken pieces of the mirror on the floor.
Each of the fragments reflected his body – a thoroughly ordinary body.
***
Butcher wasted no time. Having found out that Maeve, Annie, and Homelander would not be able to restore their abilities, at least not in the near future, he sorted out the documents, took Ryan, and saved Homelander's number on his phone, finding it on Ryan's brand new passwordless iPhone listed as "Dad".
Homelander with no powers... he awaited the day he’d wake out of the coma, because he wanted to see it. Butcher even inquired about updates on his health – although that was also to appease Ryan, who was very worried.
And so, about a month passed after the fateful day, when the call from the prudently saved phonenumber came through. Butcher grinned and sent it to voicemail. Again. And again. The Homelander from before would have flown to his balcony and been done with it by now, but this Homelander keeps calling. How amusing. How fun!
Another call.
"Yes," Billy answered the phone indifferently.
"Do you have Ryan? I can’t get through to him." Homelander’s voice still sounded confident, but some notes had definitely been hollowed out.
Billy smirked, patting the pocket where Ryan's phone resides. Intent on prolonging his enjoyment, he replied, "Let's suppose I do."
"Give him the phone." Homelander was still trying to sound like his same old self. But he didn’t.
"Nah."
"Tell me where you are."
Billy chuckled, noticing that the other man's voice was beginning to sound anxious.
"You never bothered with such questions before."
"Let me fucking see my son!"
"No."
Butcher was waiting. Waiting and waiting and waiting, listening to the chaotic breathing on the other end of the line. Breathing which was increasingly difficult not to confuse with sniffling.
"Please… I'm begging you! Please!"
Billy was satisfied. He closed his eyes in pleasure and hung up. It was even better than if Homelander had gone and died.
***
After spending an hour or so whimpering on the floor, John finally got up. His whole body ached and was covered in blood streaks from cuts that no longer healed in under a minute. Would he really have to live this way now…?
Homelander's eye, visible in one of the shards, winced in disgust. He would rather burn the whole world using temporary V, celebrate that the world had ended, and then jerk off on it. That would have been a sight to behold.
John would have agreed to this before, without thinking. Every movement felt off, and dragging out this existence without even getting revenge on everyone he wanted to was almost unbearable. Almost. But John had Ryan.
Even though John came in dressed in civilian clothes (Vought seemed to skimp even on this: the feel of a rough sweatshirt on his body was unpleasant), the analytics department kindly gave him Ryan's exact location, and by proxy Butcher's as well. John nodded his thanks and left the Tower as quickly as his legs allowed.
Fuck, what do people do when they need to get to a certain address and all they have is their fucking legs?
John sighed heavily. He must have forgotten his phone and now had to come back for it. The thought that "come back" now meant "to walk back" made him nauseous. Even without this kind of delay, he was already spending way too long on the trip. The phone, as well as his wallet, thankfully turned out to be in his pocket. John sighed with relief, but was simultaneously horrified. God, were all these trivialities always going to mean so much now?
Grimacing, he opened the AppStore and typed in "taxi" for the first time in his life. It took him a while to figure out how the hell Uber works.
The trip to Butcher's house turned out to be surprisingly short. Probably not surprisingly, since Butcher has nothing to fear from him now. John was as helpless as a child.
"Helpless as a child," his reflection taunted him from the car's side mirror.
John got out of the car in front of a small townhouse – it wasn't clear why Butcher would live in such a place, but there could be no mistake. John couldn't discern a smell or a sound that would confirm it from this distance, but he tried not to think about that. He needed to think about Ryan.
John took a deep breath, and blinked rapidly, trying to control the tears filling his eyes — not the time, not the place! — before he walked to the door and pressed the buzzer.
No one answered, of course.
He pressed it again and again until his fingers hurt, and then he kept it pressed down, biting his lip.
"Well look at that. He showed up! And didn’t even break in through the window,” Butcher said through the door.
"Where's Ryan?" John asked quietly. "Let me see him."
"And what if I say no? You gonna incinerate me, Homie?"
"Enough."
"Or what?" Butcher asked drawing out the phrase, excited.
"What do you want? An admission of defeat?"
"Just to enjoy this."
John clenched his fists, digging his nails into his palms.
"Let me in. Please. Please…" Tears of hatred and self-loathing treacherously welled up in his eyes, and began oozing into his voice. "I just want to see that he's okay…"
"Keep talking." Butcher did not hide his amusement and pleasure.
"Let me in, fuck!" John slid down the door, slowly dropping to his knees. “Let me in." His shoulders twitched involuntarily, and his heart was beating so hard it was starting to make him sick. "I'm asking you..."
Homelander's laughter echoed inside his skull, and it didn't need mirrors to reverberate endlessly. It was doing a splendid job of destroying John from the inside, each echo emphasizing that he was now a nobody, an absolute nobody, that they could even take Ryan away from him so easily.
"I'm begging you, Butcher!" He slammed his fist against the door. He felt dizzy, his vision swimming. He was crying and laughing, and tried to rise to his feet, but the world became completely murky. Butcher heard a noise and realized that Homelander passed out, now on the ground.
"I heard everything, Billy." Ryan looked as pale as a shadow, coming down from the second floor.
"Why aren't you at school, you little cunt?"
"They let us out early, and I flew back in."
"Damn."
***
John came to on a sofa, in an unfamiliar house, to the feeling of his face being wiped. Ryan was looking into his eyes, holding a damp cloth.
"Dad!" he cried, smiling, and hurried to hug him, and John finally got to hug him back.
"Ryan, how are you? How are you?" Mentally, John was still in that night, in the Tower, when Ryan was in danger – all because of him.
"I'm fine dad."
John hugged his son, feeling closer than ever. This child, the best one on earth, was pressed against him. Butcher won’t take that away from him.
"Visitation’s over. Fuck off to your Tower, Homie."
John opened his mouth, but Ryan was quicker.
“Billy, stop it. I want him to stay. At least until the evening."
"Ryan, no."
"Billy, that's enough." Ryan looked at Butcher, and John saw what he had been afraid to ask about, afraid to learn. He saw that he managed to save his son's powers, at least - because his son was glaring at Butcher, eyes like red embers.
"We agreed that you wouldn't use that."
"We didn’t agree that you'd be making my father cry at the door!” Ryan's eyes lit up more intensely. Fuck, he had been at home the whole time, and heard all that?... Ryan... Ryan...
Butcher's nostrils flared, and his eyes glared at them, first one, then the other.
John got up.
"William, I’m here without… any bad intentions." The words came with difficulty, as if they were barbed wire spooling up from his lungs and out of his mouth, tearing everything in their wake, especially his throat. "You won, you took… almost everything from me. I can't even use the name Homelander, imagine that." His laugh was theatrical, artificial like silk flowers. "But you can't take my son away from me, Butcher.”
"I could kill you." Butcher grinned menacingly. "And Ryan wouldn't have a say in the matter."
"Can’t wait until I’m a complete orphan in about a year," Ryan grumbled.
"What?" John and Butcher asked in unison.
"I heard what the doctors said, Billy. Idiot," Ryan said with scorn.
John glared at Butcher. Temporary V, was it. Butcher used it more than once. So all this was just the last agonies of a fatally wounded animal?
John grimaced. "I no longer have my powers. If I refuse to advertise temp V, I'll lose everything, down to the name, even my fucking living quarters. Of course, I'll still have money left ... By the way, Butcher – they're shutting down the superhero project completely. You can die in peace."
"Well," Butcher pulled his eyebrows up. "Stay with us then."
"Excuse me?"
"Becca told me to take care of the little cunt. So I'll be by his side and you can't do anything about that. I would just kick you out, if it were up to me, but since Ryan... since he..."
"I can sleep on a cot!" Ryan spoke quickly. "I agree!"
"What? Ryan, but you saw what happened. Don't you want to leave with me? We'll buy a house and everything."
"Dad, Billy's not always like this, you'll see... maybe you'll even become friends. I have my school here. By the way... you said you wouldn't be allowed to use the name Homelander. Is that not your name? What is your name, Dad?"
"John," he pronounced with a grimace. "They called me that in the lab, just because it’s the most generic name." He glanced at Butcher, expecting to see another sneer, but didn’t find one there. "I don’t know what to consider my real name."
"Dad…" Ryan hugged him tightly and John found it difficult to breathe. So that’s how it felt when you’re not a supe. "I don’t care what your name is. Stay with us."
John looked at Butcher. He seemed lost in his own thoughts.
"What do you think, Ryan…" Butcher raised his eyes and looked at him. "What would Becca say?"
Homelander winced, but Ryan became even more serious.
"Mom said that every person deserves to have a home. And that…” The boy didn’t look at John, as if avoiding his gaze. "And that if everyone had a home where they were loved, the world would be a better place."
"Sounds like her," Butcher drawled. "Okay then. I promise not to kill you at night, Homie..."
"And during the day?" John finally chuckled. "I'm not going to take revenge either. As tempting as that is."
There was an awkward silence. John felt the warmth of the sofa and contemplated that, all in all, he didn't want to go back to his room, where mirrors were broken, to the Tower, teeming with people who had suffered from his whims. Where there was that Ashley abomination. Where there were boots that he found too heavy to wear. Where it smelled like temporary V.
He took the phone and wrote to his agent that he wouldn't be returning to the Tower and agreed to terminate the contract on "these absurd and absolutely humiliating conditions of yours". He suddenly remembered that he hadn't eaten anything since he was given some sorry bland hospital-type oatmeal.
"Do you have any food?"
Butcher threw a glance at the refrigerator. Ryan looked in the same direction, but more closely. John recognized that squint.
"Two hot pockets, an apple and yogurt, I think."
"I'll order pizza." John smiled and nodded as he opened his phone. He learned how to order food when he took Ryan in from Becca, and now he was glad he kept the app.
***
The first month passed as well as it could have.
They sometimes even watched TV all together. Sometimes they ate together, awkwardly, mostly delivery. Ryan went to school, and tried his best to do well there. John sometimes spoke to him in Spanish. Butcher studiously avoided crossing paths with them and occasionally grumbled about it. John had a room to himself with a large bed that occupied almost the entire space.
John had nightmares every night on this bed. Sometimes it was his father, sometimes Vogelbaum, even Edgar. Sometimes the Mirror—Homelander.
“You're nothing. A disappointment. A mistake. A nothing. A failed experiment. A nobody."
After these dreams, he'd wake up in a cold sweat and quietly whispered to himself that Ryan would never hear anything remotely like that from him.
But the nightmares didn't stop there. The old ones, nearly forgotten, ones that he hadn't dreamed in many years of hard work at Vought had resurfaced - white walls, harsh whispers between scientists, a projector. White corridors that you weren't allowed to walk in. White rooms where you weren't allowed to play. Food measured out in grams. Caretakers who talked about him behind his back. About how creepy he is. "America is the birthplace of freedom." Walls covered with a special alloy - so that no one would hear his crying. Experimenters in lab coats, syringes, metals, experiments, needles, exercises, a projector - and he wakes up on a wet, salty pillow, feeling like there's sand in his eyes. He had to turn the pillow over and lie there without falling asleep until the morning. He hated the night.
In the morning, he would summon enough energy to drink some milk while Ryan eats his cereal. When Ryan would leave for school, John would go back to sleep, ignoring another day in which he's a worthless loser, a dumbass, a throwaway draft, just some expendable material.
Butcher usually went out a lot, and John never asked him where.
He got used to a life in which he had to use his legs, where he couldn't peer into a closed room, but despite his getting adjusting to this life, there was a heavy lump in his chest, similar to a black hole, that never went away. On the contrary, as if sensing that John was now less occupied learning how to exist like this, this hole would pull in deeper, sucking at him greedily. John tried to remember what kinds of things brought him joy, but other than ratings, the noise of the crowd, the swings of adrenaline and the feeling of power – he couldn't recall anything else.
He didn’t always come out for dinner, excusing himself by claiming that it gave William the opportunity to also spend time alone with Ryan.
In fact, he would lie in bed and stare at the wall. Or try to breathe and not think, so as not to cry. He knew that his son still had very sensitive hearing. Sometimes he'd just dig his nails into his palms. Or stare stupidly at books, not delving into the text and not even turning the pages – he didn't have enough concentration for reading. TV commercials for Vought were becoming unbearable. These ads would knock him right out of a state of hard-won peace, the fruit of two or three days of self-soothing and self-encouragement. It seemed to him that tears were now settled very close to his eyes and would keep taking revenge for all the earlier moments when he didn't let them flow.
One night, when John woke up again from a nightmare, there was a knock on the door. He swallowed, cleared his throat, and said, "Yes?"
Ryan was standing in the doorway.
"Dad. What's wrong with you?"
"I…" He didn't want to lie to his child. "To be honest, I don't know what to call it, Ryan."
"You cry every night, I can hear you. Dad, is this because... of what happened with Soldier Boy?"
"Yes." Each halting word was said with great difficulty, the lump in his throat feeling dangerously close.
"I’d give you my powers so that you wouldn't be sad, if I could."
"Ry—" How could he say that? He'd do what for him? John blinked rapidly and breathed heavily.
"Really..." Ryan walked up to John sitting on the bed and puts his arm around his shoulders.
"Thank you," John said in a hollow voice. "Sorry that I'm not letting you sleep."
Ryan frowned.
"It’s not only you."
***
It didn't take more than a couple of days for John to understand what Ryan was talking about.
He scraped himself out of bed one morning and made his way towards the kitchen as usual, when he heard nasty noises coming from Butcher's room.
At breakfast, Ryan behaved as if nothing was amiss, but John did not touch the food, and, after seeing his son off, didn't go upstairs, as he usually did.
William Butcher came out into the kitchen around noon, not looking well.
"Hey," John said casually, got a nod in response and before he had time to turn away, Butcher was suddenly throwing up something black on the floor.
"Ugh, what are you…"
Butcher vomited again, and John felt nauseous, so he said the first that came to mind. "The fuck did you eat?"
Butcher was still spitting out the rest. "My brain is rotting away, idiot. Thanks to your company’s most recent invention."
"I don’t have anything to do with Vought anymore," John retorted in an icy tone. "Are you going to clean it yourself or...?"
“I’ll do it… Fuck off. Ryan will be back soon."
Butcher took out a rag, a mop, and a bucket from somewhere and began to wash the floor, almost without grimacing.
"You know Ryan’s going to smell this, even if you spend three days scrubbing this floor?"
Butcher looked up at him. "I try not to think about that." He leaned down to go back to rubbing the floor.
"I can order a cleaning."
"Go to hell." Butcher straightened up sharply, but lost his balance and grabbed the wall. "Fuck. Fine, fucking call them up."
***
"Smells like bleach in here," Ryan remarked as soon as he entered. "You guys cleaned?" He glanced at William and John who, oddly enough, were sitting together in the kitchen.
"You could say that," Butcher said with a shrug. "Enjoy dinner, I'm already full for today."
***
John runs down a white corridor, followed by a big group of men in white lab coats. Blinding light floods the maze, where there's tortures around every corner, but he runs, trying and failing, his skin covered in goosebumps from fear, until he falls into a white abyss, to the sound of his own laughter coming out of thousands of pieces of a broken mirror.
John woke up in a cold sweat and tried to calm down. He took the phone to see the time: 02:48.
His text message, phone call and social media notifications were clogging up his screen, and how annoying they were! John started clearing them out, finding a text from Butcher earlier that day.
"thx for the cleaning. and reminding me how r. senses everything"
John chuckled bitterly and sent an answer: "I just remember how it was for me. No problem!” and put down the phone. However a text banner reappeared on his screen almost immediately.
"aren't you sleeping?"
“No. Can't fall asleep."
"you fucking with me"
"Generally, yes."
"then fuck off"
"Are you sick again?"
“fuck no, life's a fuckin piece of cake
of course i feel sick
hate it
my head feels like absolute shit"
"I can bring you some painkillers."
"go fuck yourself you don’t think i already took them? dickhead"
"Um...sorry?"
"fuck off"
John put down the phone. It wasn't the most pleasant of conversations – but at least it distracted him. Maybe he'd even be able to fall back asleep.
***
A couple more days went by. Or a week - John wasn’t keeping track of time. One morning he didn't even go out for breakfast. He just didn't have the will to get up.
"ryan wrote you didnt come out all morning"
"yeah"
"why not"
"can't make myself."
"the fuck?"
"Go fuck yourself"
There was a knock on his door.
"Uh.h.. John? What's going on?”
"As if you care," John said indifferently, still in bed, "As if anyone gives a fuck."
Butcher still opened the door and walked in past the threshold.
"The little cunt is right. I'll die soon, and you'll be the only one he has left."
"And how the fuck is that relevant?"
"I want to do something for him while I still have a chance. You're not okay, and that's going to become his problem."
"Shut up."
"You lie around in bed all day and do shit-all. I’m going to kick the bucket, and then Ryan's going to be saddled with this... wet rag you've become. So it's bothering me."
"Shut up." John struggled to hold back his tears and spoke, his breathing erratic. "I'm not Homelander anymore. Not only can I no longer do whatever I want - I can’t fucking do anything anymore, and I don’t want anything! What you see here is just a dull and useless husk of what I used to be that can't even be fucking recycled." Tears and snot kept threatening to start flowing, and he worked to draw them back in. "I'd rather be dead, you know? Are you fucking happy?"
"Alright, alright, shh," Butcher raised his hands in a gesture of peace.
"I'M ASKING YOU, ARE YOU HAPPY NOW?" John screams.
Butcher felt lost for words. He could suddenly see a little boy who looked like Ryan in front of him, hysterical, and he remembered Vogelbaum's words. “When he was a little boy, five or six, he was quite sweet. He’d cuddle up to me."
Butcher came over, leaned down, and hugged him.
"It’s your fault!" John was trembling. "Bastard, you killed both of us." Tears were dripping down on the black Hawaiian shirt with cranes on it, and John wondered why they weren't eating through it like they do to him.
"Oi, oi..." Butcher stroked John's hair mechanically, like he used to console Becca when she was crying, and felt John's arms cautiously hug him in response. "Shh."