freaks of nature - stenbrough

-11-

TW: attempted suicide, fighting, child abuse, murder
(A/N): shes unedited and long. it will make more sense in the next chapter i promise.

——

Bill waited in his room for Stryker to arrive. When he did, the door swung open at lightning speed. Stryker was angry. He was angry most of the time, but his anger was hiding his hurt which Bill could see clearly, even without his mutation he was good at reading people.

"Get over here you little shit," he grumbled.

Bill quickly pushed himself to his feet and obliged. He walked over and Stryker grabbed his waist and picked him up.

"What the fuck! Get off me!" Bill screamed.

He wrestled with Stryker. He fell out of his grip, but ended up being dragged out of the small prison cell like room.

"What did I do!?"
"I know you used your mutation to talk to your boyfriend."
"How did y-you even kn-know and he's not my boyfriend!"
"The chips in our minds tell us when you're using your mutation. We told you, we took every precaution."
"When he b-b-breaks down it hurts me! I w-wanted him to stop!" Bill thrashed and kicked.
"Stop fucking moving!"

Stryker threw him on the ground and kicked him in his side. Bill whimpered and curled into a ball the way he used to do when Henry would attack him. Stryker just kept kicking him. Bill held back tears as he took the beating. Another agent ran behind Stryker and pulled him off Bill. He restrained Sryker pushed him into a room coming off the deep hallway. An agent Bill didn't know the name of came over and helped him to his feet.

"Hey," her voice was soft and sort of calming.

She looked to be about Bill's age...and eerily familiar. She had short black hair down to her shoulders pinned out of her face with two brown bobby pins. Her cheeks were dotted with soft brown freckles. She wore red lipstick outlining her white teeth as she smiled softly at him. Just looking at her immediately calmed him down.

"Are you okay?" She asked.
"Y-yeah...just I w-wasn't expecting to be p-pulverised today."
"He hasn't been okay since Rumlow passed. Something changed with him, I'm not sure what it is. Anyway, I can take you to have a cold shower, then we'll take you back to your room for the night. How does that sound?"
"Good," he attempted to smile back, but he was so broken it looked more like a pout.
"Come on, let's go."

They began walking down the hall and she talked about how long she'd been with the MHA. She explained how she was a mutant and she understood what he was going through. She also promised to make sure that she'd keep him out of harms way.

"Y-you never told m-me your name," Bill said sheepishly, fumbling with the towel she'd given him, "a-and I'm pretty sure I kn-know you."
"Oh, I'm Agent Ripsom, but you can call me Betty. Nice to see you again Bill."

She winked at him before walking out, leaving him alone in the bathroom. Bill watched her leave as his mouth hung open.

Betty had been taken by the MHA three years prior. They were chemistry partners and got along quite well, he even thought he had a crush on her before realising he was gay. One day she stopped coming to class and her face was on missing papers all across town. Her mutation wasn't dangerous either. She could make things grow. Vines, trees, flowers. They'd twist and turn creating whatever design she had envisioned in her mind. It was beautiful, at least Bill thought so. The MHA had other plans. Her family looked for her and her brother for a year before the case had no more leads and went cold as the police weren't allowed to investigate government facilities.

"Betty's okay," he whispered to himself, "I wonder h-how her b-brother is."

——

Stanley had been pacing his room frantically. Bill was alive and somewhere in the facility. They were using him. He was working for them. The thought made his blood boil. He knew the last thing Bill would want to do is work for them. What made it even worse was knowing Bill was doing it for him.