SUNSHINE ― billy butcher

part two

I WAS ALIVE.

There were no words that could describe the pain I'm going through right now. No words for how my face feels sore, my neck indescribably stiff, and my body felt like it was hurled on a roller coaster without the safety bar. I feel weightless one second—and yet when I tried so much as to move my fingers, I felt it all at once.

I stopped altogether.

Holding my breath at a minimum, just enough to survive while feeling a warm pavement under me. It was rough, a hard jagged asphalt invoking the feeling of it denting my back. Did someone drop me here?

Eventually, memories flooded back like a hurl of vomit coming out of my mouth. Faces, one too many of them in a span of the night. Noir choking the light out of me, Homelander grinning evilly with every intention of killing me, Butcher—the way he looked at me, and... and her.

And Becca. Alive.

She's alive.

I forced myself to open my eyes. They were dry and painful but I flutter hard and fast, ever so slowly bringing myself to fully open it whilst a wave of heat nipped my entire body. I was desperate to move, to do anything to get rid of the pain, and opening my eyes was one step to finding out if I was discarded at a prison or worse... I willed myself not to expect the least satisfying outcome, trying to focus on my surroundings and found that I'm just—in the middle of nowhere.

Incredibly fucked.

There was nothing, as far as the eye can see. It was empty, all trees, and a backroad leading to bumfuck everywhere. The heat was at its highest, making it unforgivingly warm that I was already sweating my balls when I forced my entire body to move. My rib had an unmistaken flare into it—burning and sore that when I lift my shirt, a bruise as big as my entire hand spread out had formed, deep purple with marks across. Dried blood was sprawled across my arms, and when I shoved it under my broken nose, there was more blood there.

I looked as if I came straight out of war. Battered, barren, and angry.

But I pushed myself to walk, to try and wipe away as much blood from my face to not make me look like I've murdered a whole town. I walk, on and on while clutching my middle, holding on for dear life and certain that this heat would probably kill me more than those stupid assholes.

But walking has also provided a much-needed awakening.

Becca's alive.

Becca... she's fucking alive and all that we've done weren't for nothing. We're actually saving her—and Butcher was right. Homelander must've done something, anything, to have Becca on his grasp. And now that we have definitive proof, it was the stepping stone we needed. We can... do this.

Becca's alive.

Immense guilt had pooled on my empty stomach. It was a horrible feeling. Like I was sinking into the unknown. I have never felt bad, or worse, or terrible before and now that it hit me in the face, now that I know the truth—I felt equally as bad as the assholes we're trying to bring down. I didn't know why, but the realization of all the things I've done behind her assumed death—Butcher and... I...

I was a piece of shit.

I threw up again, on the side of the road, emptying the wasteland of my stomach. Throwing up the kisses that made my chest flutter, throwing up his touch, his gaze, his everything out of my system. Even after I was done, I wanted to force my way into throwing up more than I could handle just because it was eating me alive.

I tripped on a rock I didn't see and fell hard on my knees, not even minding a damn if it scraped clean across my jeans. I stayed there, recounting the last moments of my life and before I could slam my face with a rock for being so goddamn stupid—a car revving behind made me jump. I squinted from the dust, blinking a few more times to make sure I was not hallucinating, and yet it was real.