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bring me a dream (jack abbot x reader)

click here to read on ao3

summary: jack wakes you up from a delightful dream to make it a reality

warnings: smut, 18+ mdni, fem!reader insert, pwp, wet dream, puppy play, praise kink, pet names (puppy, good girl, babygirl), dacryphilia, overstimulation, daddy kink, dumbification, fingers in mouth, slight somnophilia, mildly dubious consent, jack touches reader while they’re sleeping, soft dom jack abbot, also age gap but it’s barely mentioned, dd:dne, dldr

words: 2.5k

a/n: hi first fic in a while and i’ve undergone some self discovery so i put almost all of my findings into one fic :p also this is my first pitt/non-marvel fic in general so plz be kind

#the pitt #jack abbot #smut #jack abbot x reader #jack abbot x you #jack abbot smut #the pitt fanfiction #ao3 writer #this man and this show have taken over my life #mr sandman

so at first i did it as a joke. then i understood...

it wasn't a joke anymore. enjoy punch out furries

this one's goin' all over the papers tomorrow

#fall out boy #americas suitehearts #dr benzedrine #mr sandman #mr benzedrine #patrick stump #pete wentz #putting tags is such a numbing experience for me idk why #peterick #oh my yaoi #🧇🦖

i have an idea for animate the end of the song 20 dollar nosebleed but idk how realistic that is. however, i like to develop a design cartoon characters and i see sandman as scp object and benzedrine as... idk he looks like tumblr sexy man you know¿¿

#fall out boy #fob #fob fanart #peterick #pete wentz #patrick stump #dr benzedrine #americas suitehearts #mr sandman

The Lost Cause Part Three

synapse: y/n’s powers have gotten stronger—thanks to henry and y/n comes to realize she likes his company more than she thought.

pairing: henry creel x female reader

contains: hawkins lab trauma, physical harm, fluff

a/n: you all asked for part three so here.

PART FOUR

. . .

The Rainbow Room buzzed with its usual noise, crayon scratching, blocks clacking, an orderly muttering instructions to one of the smaller kids. But none of that mattered.

She’d been scanning the hallway all morning, waiting.

Watching for him.

Finally, Henry stepped through the doorway, clipboard in hand, scanning the room with that forced neutrality he wore like armor. His posture was perfect, his steps measured. Not a trace remained of the pain they’d inflicted on him, except in the small, almost invisible stiffness in his movements.

He wasn’t assigned to her today. She knew that.

But it didn’t matter.

She crossed the room in a straight line.

He noticed her halfway across, his eyes flicked up from the clipboard, widening the barest fraction. He braced, almost imperceptibly, like he expected her to blow their careful distance apart.

She stopped right in front of him.

Close…too close for a subject and an orderly.

His voice was low, barely a breath. “What are you doing?”

She didn’t answer.

Instead, she cast her eyes upward, casually enough not to draw attention, but with intention.

Two cameras. One angled directly at them.

Her powers brushed out, careful, delicate like invisible fingertips nudging the air.

The first camera jerked slightly, its lens twitching to the left like it had caught a glitch.

The second shifted down, pointed suddenly toward a corner of the room where nothing happened.

Henry’s breath hitched, so small only she could hear it.

“Don’t move,” she whispered.

He obeyed.

For the first time since she’d known him, she saw him fully drop his guard. Not his mask, not his role, those never cracked. But something deeper. Something that said he suddenly felt exposed and seen in a way even he didn’t expect.

“What was that?” he murmured.

She stepped in just half an inch closer, enough that anyone looking would think they were simply speaking about a child or a task but the cameras would see nothing.

“You helped me,” she said softly. “In the hallway. In the training room. In records. You’ve saved me more than once.”

His jaw tightened. He looked past her, at a set of blocks, anywhere but her eyes.

“I didn’t save you,” he murmured. “I postponed something.”

“No.” Her voice dropped, firm but gentle. “You saved me.”

He swallowed.

She wasn’t done.

“And I wanted to thank you,” she continued, her tone threaded with something soft and dangerous. “But I couldn’t, not properly. Not where they could hear.”

Henry’s eyes finally lifted to hers.

There was something there that hadn’t been before. Something raw. Something almost vulnerable.

“You shouldn’t do this,” he whispered. “You shouldn’t draw attention. They will notice.”

“They won’t,” she said. “Not today.”

She lifted one hand, slow and subtle, and pretended to be adjusting the collar of her gown but really she nudged the last camera above the door, turning it slightly so its view cut away from them.

All three blind spots aligned.

A perfect hidden triangle around the two of them.

Henry noticed instantly.

His breath caught. “You’re getting better at that.”

“You’re the one who taught me focus.”

His lips parted slightly as if he didn’t know what to say to something so gently truthful.

She took a risk.

“You brought me into that records room,” she said quietly. “You showed me what they wrote about me. You warned me. You’re the reason I’m still…me.”

Henry’s expression shifted, something restrained cracking, just barely.

“You are you because you refuse to be anything else,” he said finally. “I didn’t give that to you.”

She shook her head. “You reminded me of it.”

Silence stretched between them.

The Rainbow Room still buzzed faintly in the background, but it all felt distant. Faded. Like the two of them occupied a pocket of space that shouldn’t exist.

His voice, when he finally spoke again, was almost too soft to hear.

“Why tell me this?” he asked.

“Because you deserve to know,” she whispered.

Henry lowered his clipboard slowly, letting it hang at his side, forgotten.

“And because you risked a lot for me,” she added. “I wanted you to know I see that. I see you.”

His breath faltered.

For a moment, just a sliver of a second, she saw something tender on his face. Something hopeful. Something that didn’t belong in Hawkins Lab.

Then he forced himself to look away, jaw tightening as he fought to pull the mask back on.

“You shouldn’t thank me,” he said quietly. “Not for something that put you in danger.”

“You didn’t put me in danger,” she countered softly. “They did. They always will.”

He looked at her again, fully this time.

“How did you know the cameras would move?” he asked, sounding almost dazed.

“They didn’t want to,” she admitted with a small, breathy laugh, her thumb quickly swiping the small drip of blood running down. “I had to… argue with them.”

His eyebrows lifted the slightest bit. “You argue with machines now?”

“Only the annoying ones.”

That ghost of a smile tugged at his mouth again, too soft, too real.

Then his face shifted back to caution.

“You can’t do this often,” he warned gently. “They will notice if the angles are wrong too many times.”

“I won’t,” she promised. “Just this once.”

“And only to thank you?”

Her tone softened dangerously. “For now.”

He inhaled slowly, eyes darting to the nearest child, then back to her.

She felt like gravity to him. Like something he couldn’t afford to move toward but also couldn’t step away from.

Finally, he said, “You don’t need to thank me.”

“Yes,” she murmured. “I do.”

And because they were hidden from every lens, every watcher, every threat—she let her hand brush his.

Barely.

Just a whisper of touch between two people who weren’t allowed to touch anything but cold metal and pain.

His fingers froze.

Then, hesitantly, delicately, he curled one finger against hers.

Nothing more. Nothing that could be caught on a camera.

Just enough to feel real.

Then he stepped back, the smallest shift.

The cameras slowly turned back into position, guided by her mind as gently as she’d nudged them away.

Henry exhaled once.

Quiet. Controlled. Almost shaken.

“We should go back to normal,” he murmured.

“Normal?” she echoed softly.

“As normal as this place allows.”

She nodded.

He lifted his clipboard.

She stepped back.

And from the outside, it looked like nothing had happened.

But both of them knew the truth:

For a moment, they had carved out a space where Brenner didn’t own them.

A moment where she thanked him.

A moment where he let himself feel it.

A moment neither of them would forget.

. . .

They didn’t tell her about the blindfold.

They just dragged her from her room before breakfast, no Rainbow Room, no Henry, just two silent orderlies and the long walk down the too-bright corridor.

Her stomach twisted when she saw which door they were heading for.

Not Testing Room C.

The larger one. Reinforced metal. Extra locks.

The one she’d heard the others whisper about. The one some children went to use their powers against each other. She was no longer a child so she would be separated to keep it fair.

“Step inside,” one of the guards said, voice flat through his helmet.

She did. The air was colder in here, humming with electricity. The floor was smooth, wide. No chair. No cuffs.

That didn’t make her feel better.

Brenner’s voice crackled through the overhead speakers.

“Good morning, 002.”

Her teeth clenched. “You dragged me out of bed for a greeting?”

“We’ve begun a new phase of your development,” he went on, ignoring her tone. “The data from your recent tests was promising. We’d like to see how well you perform under… compromised conditions.”

Compromised.

That was never a good word in this place.

A guard stepped up behind her.

Something soft, dark brushed against the side of her face.

She jerked. “What are you—?”

The blindfold slid over her eyes and everything went black.

Her breath stuttered. She grabbed for the fabric, but gloved hands caught her wrists and pinched them in place until the knot was tied tight.

Panic flared instantly, hot, dizzying, clawing at her throat. She’d been in sensory deprivation tanks before. Darkness. Silence. Weightlessness.

But this was different.

She could still hear the humming lights. Still feel the floor under her feet. Still smell the metal and rubber and disinfectant.

And yet, she was blind.

“Subject 002 will now be given a simple directive,” Brenner’s voice said. Calm. So calm. “Defend yourself against a hostile threat. Failure to respond adequately will result in… consequences.”

“Define ‘adequately,’” she snapped, trying to keep the fear out of her voice.

“Survive,” Brenner said. “Begin.”

Something moved nearby.

Heavy boots, shifting.

Her pulse spiked.

The power inside her rose, disorganized and jittery, like static crawling along her skin. Without sight, everything felt louder. Her breathing, the scrape of a shoe, the crackle of an intercom somewhere.

“First target,” a doctor’s voice murmured in the background.

She felt it before it happened, the rush of air, the displacement of weight. Someone charging.

She stumbled sideways on reflex.

A padded baton grazed her shoulder instead of slamming into her ribs. Pain flared anyway.

She lashed out with her mind, reaching blindly for the weight and shape of another body.

Nothing caught.

Her thoughts were too scattered, clawing at the dark.

Another set of footsteps. Closer. She flinched right…too slow.

A blow slammed into her back. She hit the floor, breath blasting out, blindfold pressed tighter against her face.

“Get up,” someone said. Not Brenner. One of the doctors, maybe a scientist, she didn’t care. Impatient. “Come now, 002. You can do better than that.”

She shoved herself up onto her hands and knees, head spinning.

Don’t look at them, look at me.

Henry’s voice. Quiet. Steady.

She clung to it like a rope.

Not here, she thought desperately. You’re not here. You’re not allowed in here.

But his words didn’t belong to the room. They belonged to her.

One thought at a time. Stack them. Don’t snatch—guide.

She forced a breath in. Out. In again.

Her fingers curled against the floor. It felt like nothing. Cold. Smooth.

Another rush of air.

She rolled left.

A baton sliced through the space where her head had been.

Her hand flung out. Her power followed, wild but it clipped something solid.

A grunt. A body staggering.

Her heart leapt.

“There it is,” Brenner’s voice said, faintly pleased. “Pressure yields performance. Increase intensity.”

“Oh, good,” she muttered under her breath. “That’s exactly what I wanted to hear.”

Two sets of footsteps now. Closing in from opposite sides.

She scrambled to her feet, breathing too fast.

She could feel them, mass, motion, intent but the dark made everything blur together. She swiped out with her mind again, but it scattered like water.

The first hit caught her thigh. She buckled, nearly going down. The second swung for her ribs; she managed to twist enough to turn it into a glancing blow, but pain still shot up her side.

She gasped.

You’re going to do great. Don’t let them scare you.

Henry again. In the hallway, before a test. His hand on her arm. His eyes steady.

Her knee hit the floor. The blindfold shifted slightly, but not enough to see.

Somewhere above, a doctor muttered, “Adrenaline spiking. Power output still inconsistent.”

Another baton cracked into her shoulder. She cried out, stumbling, nearly slamming face-first into the floor.

The anger that had been simmering for days surged up, hot and terrifying.

At Brenner. At the guards. At the file that had nearly ordered her erased. At the shock in Henry’s muscles as the taser lit him up.

He hurts kids. He hurts you. And for what? So he can write it down and call it science?

The memory of her own words in the Rainbow Room lit a fuse.

Something inside her snapped.

Energy flooded outward in all directions at once, a burst of raw force that rattled the air. The guards around her staggered.

“Careful,” one of the doctors warned. “She’s spiking.”

“Good,” Brenner said.

Her chest heaved.

She felt like she was drowning on land. She felt the warm trickle of blood under her nostril.

Breathe, Henry’s voice whispered in her memory. If you let it control you here, you give him exactly what he wants.

She sucked in a breath. Another. Forced herself not to flail.

Instead, she reached inward, where his words lived.

Never show them all of it. Hold something back. A part of yourself they never get to touch.

Her fear wrapped around those words and squeezed.

The footsteps came again. One guard on her left, one on her right, moving in sync.

She made herself focus.

Left. Right. Weight. Distance.

Don’t look at them. Look at me.

She pictured Henry’s face behind her eyelids. Not the way he’d looked on the floor, convulsing, but the way he’d looked in records, lamp-light on his features, eyes dark and intent.

Steady. Calm. Real.

The wild static of her power began to align, bit by bit, drawn to that point.

The guard on the left lunged.

She didn’t dodge this time.

She caught him.

Not with her hands, with her mind. Grabbing hold of the idea of him, the weight, the motion, the vector and yanked.

He slammed sideways into the second guard. They crashed together, armor clanking, hitting the floor in a tangled heap.

“Again,” Brenner’s voice said. Almost eager.

Her lungs burned. Sweat curled down her spine.

More guards. She could hear at least two sets of boots repositioning. One behind her. One in front.

The room hummed with an electric undertone. There were panels in the walls, she realized dimly. Power lines. Circuits.

She stretched her senses outward, not just toward the guards, but toward the wiring. The buzzing lines of energy that fed the lights, the door locks, the equipment.

It all vibrated. Alive. Hungry.

If you let it control you here, you give him exactly what he wants.

So don’t let it control you.

Control it.

The next attack came without warning.

She didn’t move.

The baton swung toward her ribs—

She flung her power up, not at the guard, but at the ceiling.

For one breathless second, she touched the main power line feeding the room.

It felt like grabbing lightning.

Pain shot through her skull. Her teeth rang. White exploded behind the blindfold.

She screamed but this time, she didn’t let go.

The lights overhead popped.

The hum cut out.

The world plunged from artificial brightness to deeper, heavier dark.

Someone cursed. A siren chirped faintly and then died as emergency power struggled and failed to fully kick in.

“What the—?!” a guard shouted, voice distorted by the helmet.

The circuit bucked in her grasp. She didn’t try to hold it anymore, she redirected it, shoving the raw current out, away from her, away from the walls and straight into the metal on the guards.

For a split second, the whole room was a living wire.

Electricity arced, invisible, through rubber soles and steel batons, into armor and bodies.

The guards screamed.

Their weight lifted off the floor, just a few inches, jerked upward by a ricochet of force then slammed outward like ragdolls flung by an unseen hand.

One crashed into the far wall with a sickening thud. Another hit a console; the panel sparked and went dead. A third landed somewhere near the door, armor clattering.

Silence followed. Heavy. Broken only by the faint crackle of dying power and her ragged breathing.

The blindfold pressed hot and damp against her eyes. Her knees hit the floor. Her hands dug into the cold tile.

Somewhere above, beyond, a system struggled to reroute power. Emergency lights flickered dimly to life in the hallway outside, but in here—

Nothing.

She’d blown the whole chamber.

“…remarkable,” Brenner whispered on the other side of the observation window.

“Get the backups online,” another snapped. “Now.”

“Two,” he said, tone even but edged with something new, something sharp. “You may remove your blindfold.”

Her fingers trembled as she reached up.

She tugged the knot loose.

The blindfold fell away.

The room was lit only by the soft, red glow of emergency strips along the floor. Bodies lay scattered, guards groaning, twitching, dazed but alive.

The observation glass loomed ahead, dark, reflective, but she could just make out shapes moving behind it.

Her chest heaved.

Henry wasn’t there.

But his words were.

He doesn’t get to define what that means for us.

She pushed herself to her feet slowly, every muscle trembling.

The intercom crackled.

Brenner’s voice, smooth again.

“Impressive,” he said. “It appears our ‘lost cause’ has finally decided to live up to her potential.”

She lifted her chin, anger still simmering under the exhaustion.

“Bite me, Papa. I didn’t do it for you,” she said aloud.

Her voice echoed in the dead room.

She knew he heard it.

“We’ll… debrief later,” Brenner replied, as if she hadn’t spoken. “For now, stand by.”

The line clicked off.

She sagged back against the nearest wall, sliding down until she was half sitting, half crouched. Once comfortable, she wiped the blood under her nose with the back of her hand.

Her head pounded. Her skin buzzed.

But under the pain, under the fear, one thought pulsed steady:

I did it. I survived. And I did it my way.

In the back of her mind, she could almost hear him, that soft, steady voice: I knew you could.

She let herself close her eyes for just a second, imagining his hand catching hers over a chessboard, his fingers guiding a pawn back to its square.

When the lights finally flickered back to life, she was still there.

Not broken.

Not erased.

More dangerous than ever and not in the way Brenner thought.

. . .

Her room was too quiet when they brought her back.

No Rainbow Room stop. No food. Just the click of the lock and the shove between her shoulder blades as the orderly pushed her inside.

She stumbled, caught herself on the edge of her bed, and waited for the door to slam.

It did.

The sound echoed in her bones.

For a second, she just stood there, breathing. The blindfold marks still burned around her eyes. Her ribs ached where the batons had connected. Little sparks of leftover power still jittered at the edges of her fingers.

She finally let herself flop back on the thin mattress.

The pillow crinkled.

She frowned and sat up again.

There was something under it.

She lifted the edge of the pillow carefully.

A folded square of paper slid out, landing in her lap.

Her heart lurched.

Nobody gave them paper. Not without supervision. Not like this.

Her fingers shook as she unfolded it.

The handwriting was small, precise, almost painfully neat.

Cameras in your hallway will be down at 0000 hours for scheduled maintenance. Take my card. Come to Sublevel B. End of the main corridor, through the double doors.

– H

Something else slipped from the fold, landing beside her leg with a soft tap.

A key card. White, with the lab’s logo and an orderly clearance strip along the bottom.

Henry’s.

Her breath stuttered.

She read the note again. Then a third time, just to be sure she wasn’t hallucinating.

“Sublevel B,” she whispered.

The basement.

She glanced up at the corner of her room. Red camera light, still on. Watching.

She folded the note back in on itself, slid both note and card under her mattress, and forced herself to lie back, eyes on the ceiling.

She waited.

Ticking. Humming. The slow movement of shadows under the door.

Her body hurt too much to sleep, but exhaustion pulled at her anyway. Every time she blinked, she saw flashes of bodies flying, the room exploding into dark, Brenner’s voice dripping through the intercom.

When the lights finally clicked to night cycle and the soft chime signaled curfew, she jolted.

She rolled onto her side, eyes on the clock above the door. The clock she once begged Papa to know what it meant or does and how to read it.

11:56.

Her heart started beating faster.

11:58.

She swung her legs over the bed, fingers feeling blindly for the edge of the mattress. The paper crinkled under her hand. The cool plastic of the key card slid into her palm.

11:59.

The red camera light in the corner blinked once.

Twice.

Then went dark.

Right on time.

She exhaled slowly, like she’d been holding that breath for hours.

“Okay,” she whispered to herself. “Okay, okay…”

She slipped off the bed, landing as silently as she could. She padded to the door and pressed her ear against it.

Nothing.

Her thumb slid the card through the panel beside the handle.

For half a heartbeat, she thought it wouldn’t work.

Then: beep. A soft click.

The lock disengaged.

She cracked the door an inch, peered out.

The hallway was dim and empty, lit by that eerie blue night-light glow. The cameras along the ceiling were dark, lenses still.

Her pulse roared in her ears.

She slipped out, closed the door behind her, and started walking.

Bare feet. Soft steps. The card clutched tightly in her hand.

Sublevel B.

She’d never been down there.

She reached the double doors at the end of the main hall, quickly swiping Henry’s key card.

For a second, nothing.

Then the quiet beep with a light changing to green to signal it was unlocked.

She pushed through one ands immediately took a left, stepping down a few small flight of stairs.

At the very end of the corridor, two double doors loomed. No windows. Not even a keypad or a swipe slot. Just a simple unlocked door.

She gently turned the handle, slowly pushing the door open and quickly stepping inside.

The basement still smelled like dust and cold metal when she slipped through the double doors.

The air down here was heavier, like the building’s bones were older and didn’t bother pretending to be kind. Her bare footsteps made almost no sound on the concrete, but her heart was loud enough to give her away.

Henry was already there.

Half-shadowed between pipes and plastic sheeting, the emergency lamp painting a thin line along his cheekbone. He turned the second he heard her, and before she could even speak, his hand found her wrist and pulled her inside.

Quick. Controlled. Like he couldn’t afford to hesitate.

The door whispered shut behind her.

“Easy,” he murmured, quieter this time, guiding her into a darker corner between two shelving units. “If someone comes down here—”

“I know,” she breathed, letting him move her where he wanted. She didn’t fight it. She didn’t even make a joke. She just let the warmth of his hand exist on her skin for one more second than necessary, like her body was memorizing it.

He released her immediately, like he’d caught himself.

The loss of it made her chest tighten in a way she hated.

Henry’s gaze swept her face, then her shoulders, then lower, quick and clinical at first… until it wasn’t.

He saw the bruises.

The way her breath caught when she shifted. The faint swelling along her forearm.

His expression tightened with something sharp and quiet.

“I heard what you did,” he said, voice low. “The power outage. The guards.”

She tried to shrug and immediately regretted it, wincing when pain sparked in her ribs.

“Yeah,” she managed. “I really went for the dramatic lighting.”

That ghost of humor flickered in his eyes then disappeared.

“I’m proud,” Henry said simply.

It hit her harder than anything Brenner had done.

Her throat tightened and she looked down so he wouldn’t see it.

“You shouldn’t be,” she muttered. “I almost failed.”

“But you didn’t,” he corrected. “You listened. You adapted. You used the room instead of fighting it.” His voice softened. “You survived.”

She didn’t answer.

Her eyes drifted back up to him instead because it was easier than looking at the bruises, easier than looking at the truth of her own body. Easier than feeling how hard her hands wanted to reach for something steady and warm and real.

Henry noticed her staring.

His fingers, still at his sides, flexed slightly like he wanted to do something and didn’t know if he was allowed.

“What?” he asked quietly.

She blinked, heat creeping up her neck.

“Nothing,” she said too fast.

He tilted his head the smallest amount, studying her like he always did except this time it didn’t feel like observation. It felt like he was trying to understand something delicate.

“You’re doing it again,” he murmured.

“Doing what?”

“Looking at me like I’m—” He stopped himself, jaw tightening, eyes flicking away. “Never mind.”

Her heart stuttered.

She swallowed and forced her voice to steady. “I… didn’t think you’d be here.”

“I said I needed to see you,” he replied, eyes back on her now. “And I meant it.”

Silence settled between them, thick as the shadows around the shelves.

A strand of her hair had slipped free from her tie during the walk down, dark and loose, falling across her cheek and catching on the edge of the bruise there. It tickled, irritating, but she didn’t move to fix it.

Henry’s gaze caught on it.

He stared for a beat too long.

Then, carefully, he lifted his hand.

Slow. Like he was approaching a wild animal that might bolt.

“Hold still,” he said, voice so quiet it almost didn’t exist.

Her breath caught anyway.

She nodded once, barely.

His fingers brushed the loose strand, light, cautious—tucking it back behind her ear. His knuckles skimmed the side of her face, hovering over the bruise without pressing into it.

It wasn’t even the touch itself that made her feel unsteady.

It was the gentleness.

The fact that he was careful.

That he was acting like she was something that could be hurt… and mattered enough not to.

Her eyelids fluttered involuntarily, the smallest reaction she couldn’t stop, and she hated how obvious it felt. She hated how her body leaned into the warmth before her mind could catch up.

Henry’s hand stilled.

His eyes darkened slightly, as if he’d noticed too.

“Your hair,” he murmured, swallowing. “It’s—”

“Mine,” she whispered, the word coming out sharper than she meant. Then softer, like an admission, “They never took it.”

He lowered his hand slowly. “They stopped trying.”

“They thought I wasn’t worth it.”

Henry’s jaw tightened. “They were wrong.”

Her throat burned.

Another strand slipped loose as she shifted, and the messy tie at the nape of her neck sagged. She reached back to fix it and hissed when her shoulder protested.

Henry’s gaze flicked to her hand, then to her face.

“You can’t lift your arm,” he observed.

“I can,” she lied.

He didn’t argue.

He just stepped closer, close enough that the air changed, close enough that she could feel the heat of him in the cold basement.

“I’ll do it,” he said.

Her stomach flipped.

“You don’t have to,” she whispered.

“I want to,” he replied, so quietly it felt like it wasn’t meant to be heard.

She turned slightly, giving him access, and the movement made her ribs ache. She bit down on her lip to keep from making a sound.

Henry’s hands hovered for a second behind her head, as if he was asking permission without words.

Then his fingers slid into her hair.

Gentle. Careful. He gathered it slowly, smoothing it back as though he was afraid of pulling too hard, as though he could feel every bruise under her skin with his fingertips.

She stared straight ahead, hands clenched lightly in her lap because she didn’t trust them not to reach back for him.

She didn’t trust herself not to turn into the touch.

Henry worked silently, using the elastic she’d tied it with, tightening it just enough to hold but not enough to hurt. His knuckles grazed the back of her neck once, accidentally, and a shiver ran through her before she could stop it.

He froze.

“Sorry,” he murmured.

“Don’t,” she whispered immediately. “Don’t be sorry.”

His hands stayed there for another beat, warm at the nape of her neck.

Then he finished, fingers lingering like he forgot what to do with them when there was no task left.

When he finally stepped back, she turned to face him again, hair neatly secured.

He looked… different. Not softer exactly, he was still Henry, still controlled but like something in him had shifted, pulled slightly out of place.

As if he’d just done something forbidden.

“You look…” he started.

“Less like a disaster?” she offered, trying to make it a joke.

His lips twitched. “Less like you were dragged through a combat chamber.”

“That’s one way to put it.”

His eyes moved over her face again, then down to her arm, where the bruise darkened.

“Let me see,” he murmured.

She didn’t look away this time. “I’m fine,” she lied again, because she didn’t want him to see her as fragile.

Henry’s gaze lifted, steady, unblinking.

“You don’t have to be fine with me,” he said.

The words loosened something inside her chest that she’d been holding too tight.

She swallowed, voice quiet. “You shouldn’t do things like this.”

“Like what?”

“Care.”

A flicker of something, sad, bitter, crossed his face.

“I’ve already been punished for it,” he said, voice flat. “It’s too late to pretend I don’t.”

Her pulse thundered.

She stared at him, at the sharp line of his jaw, the dark fall of his lashes, the way the low light made him look carved out of shadow and glass.

And before she could stop herself, her voice came out in a whisper that felt like truth: “Thank you.”

Henry’s eyes held hers. The air between them went tight.

“For what?” he asked, though he knew.

“For seeing me,” she said. “For… not letting them erase me. For coming back.”

His throat bobbed as he swallowed.

“Always,” he murmured, and the word sounded like a promise he didn’t have the right to make.

Footsteps echoed faintly somewhere far above, just a distant sound down the corridor, maybe a guard passing, maybe nothing.

Henry’s body shifted instantly, alert, all instinct.

He stepped closer again, not touching her this time but placing himself between her and the door, his voice a whisper.

“We need to get you back,” he said.

She nodded, but she didn’t move right away.

Not because she was stubborn.

Because her body felt warmer than it had in months, and the cold basement air suddenly seemed unbearable.

Henry watched her for a beat, eyes narrowing slightly, as if he could read the war inside her: the need to stay, the fear of getting caught.

His gaze softened just a fraction. “Come on,” he murmured, and this time when he reached for her wrist, his fingers didn’t clamp down like before.

They rested there. Steady. Gentle.

Long enough for her to breathe.

Then he guided her toward the door and back into the humming belly of the lab, two shadows moving through the dark, carrying a secret warmth that the cameras would never understand.

#fanfic #stranger things season 5 #vecna stranger things #001 stranger things #stranger things season 4 #stranger things #henry creel x you #henry creel x y/n #henry creel x reader #vecna/henry/001 #vecnussy #peter ballard #jamie campbell bower x reader #jamie bower #jamie campbell bower #mr whatsit x reader #mr whatsit #mr sandman #female reader

First post on this blog

#punch out fanart #punch out 2009 #punch out wii #punch out #great tiger #mr sandman #fanart #shitpost

I FINISHED IT!!! YAY YIPPIE! Lyricstuck time :)

I have started sooooo many of these over the years for so many different fandoms and I have never finished one like this! I'm soooo happy to share this now :D All images under the readmore!

#gravity falls #stanford pines #bill cipher #fiddleford mcgucket #stanley pines #billford #lyricstuck #lyric comic #mr sandman #my art #gf #Youtube

Mr. Sandman PLEASE back up

#fall out boy #art #bandom #patrick stump #pete wentz #peterick #american suitehearts #Mr sandman #dr benzedrine #mr benzedrine

The Lost Cause Part Three

synapse: y/n’s powers have gotten stronger—thanks to henry and y/n comes to realize she likes his company more than she thought.

pairing: henry creel x female reader

contains: hawkins lab trauma, physical harm, fluff

a/n: you all asked for part three so here.

PART FOUR

. . .

The Rainbow Room buzzed with its usual noise, crayon scratching, blocks clacking, an orderly muttering instructions to one of the smaller kids. But none of that mattered.

She’d been scanning the hallway all morning, waiting.

Watching for him.

He wasn’t assigned to her today. She knew that.

But it didn’t matter.

She crossed the room in a straight line.

He noticed her halfway across, his eyes flicked up from the clipboard, widening the barest fraction. He braced, almost imperceptibly, like he expected her to blow their careful distance apart.

She stopped right in front of him.

Close…too close for a subject and an orderly.

His voice was low, barely a breath. “What are you doing?”

She didn’t answer.

Instead, she cast her eyes upward, casually enough not to draw attention, but with intention.

Two cameras. One angled directly at them.

Her powers brushed out, careful, delicate like invisible fingertips nudging the air.

The first camera jerked slightly, its lens twitching to the left like it had caught a glitch.

The second shifted down, pointed suddenly toward a corner of the room where nothing happened.

Henry’s breath hitched, so small only she could hear it.

“Don’t move,” she whispered.

He obeyed.

“What was that?” he murmured.

She stepped in just half an inch closer, enough that anyone looking would think they were simply speaking about a child or a task but the cameras would see nothing.

“You helped me,” she said softly. “In the hallway. In the training room. In records. You’ve saved me more than once.”

His jaw tightened. He looked past her, at a set of blocks, anywhere but her eyes.

“I didn’t save you,” he murmured. “I postponed something.”

“No.” Her voice dropped, firm but gentle. “You saved me.”

He swallowed.

She wasn’t done.

“And I wanted to thank you,” she continued, her tone threaded with something soft and dangerous. “But I couldn’t, not properly. Not where they could hear.”

Henry’s eyes finally lifted to hers.

There was something there that hadn’t been before. Something raw. Something almost vulnerable.

“You shouldn’t do this,” he whispered. “You shouldn’t draw attention. They will notice.”

“They won’t,” she said. “Not today.”

She lifted one hand, slow and subtle, and pretended to be adjusting the collar of her gown but really she nudged the last camera above the door, turning it slightly so its view cut away from them.

All three blind spots aligned.

A perfect hidden triangle around the two of them.

Henry noticed instantly.

His breath caught. “You’re getting better at that.”

“You’re the one who taught me focus.”

His lips parted slightly as if he didn’t know what to say to something so gently truthful.

She took a risk.

“You brought me into that records room,” she said quietly. “You showed me what they wrote about me. You warned me. You’re the reason I’m still…me.”

Henry’s expression shifted, something restrained cracking, just barely.

“You are you because you refuse to be anything else,” he said finally. “I didn’t give that to you.”

She shook her head. “You reminded me of it.”

Silence stretched between them.

The Rainbow Room still buzzed faintly in the background, but it all felt distant. Faded. Like the two of them occupied a pocket of space that shouldn’t exist.

His voice, when he finally spoke again, was almost too soft to hear.

“Why tell me this?” he asked.

“Because you deserve to know,” she whispered.

Henry lowered his clipboard slowly, letting it hang at his side, forgotten.

“And because you risked a lot for me,” she added. “I wanted you to know I see that. I see you.”

His breath faltered.

For a moment, just a sliver of a second, she saw something tender on his face. Something hopeful. Something that didn’t belong in Hawkins Lab.

Then he forced himself to look away, jaw tightening as he fought to pull the mask back on.

“You shouldn’t thank me,” he said quietly. “Not for something that put you in danger.”

“You didn’t put me in danger,” she countered softly. “They did. They always will.”

He looked at her again, fully this time.

“How did you know the cameras would move?” he asked, sounding almost dazed.

“They didn’t want to,” she admitted with a small, breathy laugh, her thumb quickly swiping the small drip of blood running down. “I had to… argue with them.”

His eyebrows lifted the slightest bit. “You argue with machines now?”

“Only the annoying ones.”

That ghost of a smile tugged at his mouth again, too soft, too real.

Then his face shifted back to caution.

“You can’t do this often,” he warned gently. “They will notice if the angles are wrong too many times.”

“I won’t,” she promised. “Just this once.”

“And only to thank you?”

Her tone softened dangerously. “For now.”

He inhaled slowly, eyes darting to the nearest child, then back to her.

She felt like gravity to him. Like something he couldn’t afford to move toward but also couldn’t step away from.

Finally, he said, “You don’t need to thank me.”

“Yes,” she murmured. “I do.”

And because they were hidden from every lens, every watcher, every threat—she let her hand brush his.

Barely.

Just a whisper of touch between two people who weren’t allowed to touch anything but cold metal and pain.

His fingers froze.

Then, hesitantly, delicately, he curled one finger against hers.

Nothing more. Nothing that could be caught on a camera.

Just enough to feel real.

Then he stepped back, the smallest shift.

The cameras slowly turned back into position, guided by her mind as gently as she’d nudged them away.

Henry exhaled once.

Quiet. Controlled. Almost shaken.

“We should go back to normal,” he murmured.

“Normal?” she echoed softly.

“As normal as this place allows.”

She nodded.

He lifted his clipboard.

She stepped back.

And from the outside, it looked like nothing had happened.

But both of them knew the truth:

For a moment, they had carved out a space where Brenner didn’t own them.

A moment where she thanked him.

A moment where he let himself feel it.

A moment neither of them would forget.

. . .

They didn’t tell her about the blindfold.

They just dragged her from her room before breakfast, no Rainbow Room, no Henry, just two silent orderlies and the long walk down the too-bright corridor.

Her stomach twisted when she saw which door they were heading for.

Not Testing Room C.

The larger one. Reinforced metal. Extra locks.

The one she’d heard the others whisper about. The one some children went to use their powers against each other. She was no longer a child so she would be separated to keep it fair.

“Step inside,” one of the guards said, voice flat through his helmet.

She did. The air was colder in here, humming with electricity. The floor was smooth, wide. No chair. No cuffs.

That didn’t make her feel better.

Brenner’s voice crackled through the overhead speakers.

“Good morning, 002.”

Her teeth clenched. “You dragged me out of bed for a greeting?”

Compromised.

That was never a good word in this place.

A guard stepped up behind her.

Something soft, dark brushed against the side of her face.

She jerked. “What are you—?”

The blindfold slid over her eyes and everything went black.

Her breath stuttered. She grabbed for the fabric, but gloved hands caught her wrists and pinched them in place until the knot was tied tight.

Panic flared instantly, hot, dizzying, clawing at her throat. She’d been in sensory deprivation tanks before. Darkness. Silence. Weightlessness.

But this was different.

She could still hear the humming lights. Still feel the floor under her feet. Still smell the metal and rubber and disinfectant.

And yet, she was blind.

“Define ‘adequately,’” she snapped, trying to keep the fear out of her voice.

“Survive,” Brenner said. “Begin.”

Something moved nearby.

Heavy boots, shifting.

Her pulse spiked.

“First target,” a doctor’s voice murmured in the background.

She felt it before it happened, the rush of air, the displacement of weight. Someone charging.

She stumbled sideways on reflex.

A padded baton grazed her shoulder instead of slamming into her ribs. Pain flared anyway.

She lashed out with her mind, reaching blindly for the weight and shape of another body.

Nothing caught.

Her thoughts were too scattered, clawing at the dark.

Another set of footsteps. Closer. She flinched right…too slow.

A blow slammed into her back. She hit the floor, breath blasting out, blindfold pressed tighter against her face.

“Get up,” someone said. Not Brenner. One of the doctors, maybe a scientist, she didn’t care. Impatient. “Come now, 002. You can do better than that.”

She shoved herself up onto her hands and knees, head spinning.

Don’t look at them, look at me.

Henry’s voice. Quiet. Steady.

She clung to it like a rope.

Not here, she thought desperately. You’re not here. You’re not allowed in here.

But his words didn’t belong to the room. They belonged to her.

One thought at a time. Stack them. Don’t snatch—guide.

She forced a breath in. Out. In again.

Her fingers curled against the floor. It felt like nothing. Cold. Smooth.

Another rush of air.

She rolled left.

A baton sliced through the space where her head had been.

Her hand flung out. Her power followed, wild but it clipped something solid.

A grunt. A body staggering.

Her heart leapt.

“There it is,” Brenner’s voice said, faintly pleased. “Pressure yields performance. Increase intensity.”

“Oh, good,” she muttered under her breath. “That’s exactly what I wanted to hear.”

Two sets of footsteps now. Closing in from opposite sides.

She scrambled to her feet, breathing too fast.

She could feel them, mass, motion, intent but the dark made everything blur together. She swiped out with her mind again, but it scattered like water.

The first hit caught her thigh. She buckled, nearly going down. The second swung for her ribs; she managed to twist enough to turn it into a glancing blow, but pain still shot up her side.

She gasped.

You’re going to do great. Don’t let them scare you.

Henry again. In the hallway, before a test. His hand on her arm. His eyes steady.

Her knee hit the floor. The blindfold shifted slightly, but not enough to see.

Somewhere above, a doctor muttered, “Adrenaline spiking. Power output still inconsistent.”

Another baton cracked into her shoulder. She cried out, stumbling, nearly slamming face-first into the floor.

The anger that had been simmering for days surged up, hot and terrifying.

At Brenner. At the guards. At the file that had nearly ordered her erased. At the shock in Henry’s muscles as the taser lit him up.

He hurts kids. He hurts you. And for what? So he can write it down and call it science?

The memory of her own words in the Rainbow Room lit a fuse.

Something inside her snapped.

Energy flooded outward in all directions at once, a burst of raw force that rattled the air. The guards around her staggered.

“Careful,” one of the doctors warned. “She’s spiking.”

“Good,” Brenner said.

Her chest heaved.

She felt like she was drowning on land. She felt the warm trickle of blood under her nostril.

Breathe, Henry’s voice whispered in her memory. If you let it control you here, you give him exactly what he wants.

She sucked in a breath. Another. Forced herself not to flail.

Instead, she reached inward, where his words lived.

Never show them all of it. Hold something back. A part of yourself they never get to touch.

Her fear wrapped around those words and squeezed.

The footsteps came again. One guard on her left, one on her right, moving in sync.

She made herself focus.

Left. Right. Weight. Distance.

Don’t look at them. Look at me.

She pictured Henry’s face behind her eyelids. Not the way he’d looked on the floor, convulsing, but the way he’d looked in records, lamp-light on his features, eyes dark and intent.

Steady. Calm. Real.

The wild static of her power began to align, bit by bit, drawn to that point.

The guard on the left lunged.

She didn’t dodge this time.

She caught him.

Not with her hands, with her mind. Grabbing hold of the idea of him, the weight, the motion, the vector and yanked.

He slammed sideways into the second guard. They crashed together, armor clanking, hitting the floor in a tangled heap.

“Again,” Brenner’s voice said. Almost eager.

Her lungs burned. Sweat curled down her spine.

More guards. She could hear at least two sets of boots repositioning. One behind her. One in front.

The room hummed with an electric undertone. There were panels in the walls, she realized dimly. Power lines. Circuits.

She stretched her senses outward, not just toward the guards, but toward the wiring. The buzzing lines of energy that fed the lights, the door locks, the equipment.

It all vibrated. Alive. Hungry.

If you let it control you here, you give him exactly what he wants.

So don’t let it control you.

Control it.

The next attack came without warning.

She didn’t move.

The baton swung toward her ribs—

She flung her power up, not at the guard, but at the ceiling.

For one breathless second, she touched the main power line feeding the room.

It felt like grabbing lightning.

Pain shot through her skull. Her teeth rang. White exploded behind the blindfold.

She screamed but this time, she didn’t let go.

The lights overhead popped.

The hum cut out.

The world plunged from artificial brightness to deeper, heavier dark.

Someone cursed. A siren chirped faintly and then died as emergency power struggled and failed to fully kick in.

“What the—?!” a guard shouted, voice distorted by the helmet.

The circuit bucked in her grasp. She didn’t try to hold it anymore, she redirected it, shoving the raw current out, away from her, away from the walls and straight into the metal on the guards.

For a split second, the whole room was a living wire.

Electricity arced, invisible, through rubber soles and steel batons, into armor and bodies.

The guards screamed.

Their weight lifted off the floor, just a few inches, jerked upward by a ricochet of force then slammed outward like ragdolls flung by an unseen hand.

One crashed into the far wall with a sickening thud. Another hit a console; the panel sparked and went dead. A third landed somewhere near the door, armor clattering.

Silence followed. Heavy. Broken only by the faint crackle of dying power and her ragged breathing.

The blindfold pressed hot and damp against her eyes. Her knees hit the floor. Her hands dug into the cold tile.

Somewhere above, beyond, a system struggled to reroute power. Emergency lights flickered dimly to life in the hallway outside, but in here—

Nothing.

She’d blown the whole chamber.

“…remarkable,” Brenner whispered on the other side of the observation window.

“Get the backups online,” another snapped. “Now.”

“Two,” he said, tone even but edged with something new, something sharp. “You may remove your blindfold.”

Her fingers trembled as she reached up.

She tugged the knot loose.

The blindfold fell away.

The room was lit only by the soft, red glow of emergency strips along the floor. Bodies lay scattered, guards groaning, twitching, dazed but alive.

The observation glass loomed ahead, dark, reflective, but she could just make out shapes moving behind it.

Her chest heaved.

Henry wasn’t there.

But his words were.

He doesn’t get to define what that means for us.

She pushed herself to her feet slowly, every muscle trembling.

The intercom crackled.

Brenner’s voice, smooth again.

“Impressive,” he said. “It appears our ‘lost cause’ has finally decided to live up to her potential.”

She lifted her chin, anger still simmering under the exhaustion.

“Bite me, Papa. I didn’t do it for you,” she said aloud.

Her voice echoed in the dead room.

She knew he heard it.

“We’ll… debrief later,” Brenner replied, as if she hadn’t spoken. “For now, stand by.”

The line clicked off.

She sagged back against the nearest wall, sliding down until she was half sitting, half crouched. Once comfortable, she wiped the blood under her nose with the back of her hand.

Her head pounded. Her skin buzzed.

But under the pain, under the fear, one thought pulsed steady:

I did it. I survived. And I did it my way.

In the back of her mind, she could almost hear him, that soft, steady voice: I knew you could.

She let herself close her eyes for just a second, imagining his hand catching hers over a chessboard, his fingers guiding a pawn back to its square.

When the lights finally flickered back to life, she was still there.

Not broken.

Not erased.

More dangerous than ever and not in the way Brenner thought.

. . .

Her room was too quiet when they brought her back.

No Rainbow Room stop. No food. Just the click of the lock and the shove between her shoulder blades as the orderly pushed her inside.

She stumbled, caught herself on the edge of her bed, and waited for the door to slam.

It did.

The sound echoed in her bones.

She finally let herself flop back on the thin mattress.

The pillow crinkled.

She frowned and sat up again.

There was something under it.

She lifted the edge of the pillow carefully.

A folded square of paper slid out, landing in her lap.

Her heart lurched.

Nobody gave them paper. Not without supervision. Not like this.

Her fingers shook as she unfolded it.

The handwriting was small, precise, almost painfully neat.

Cameras in your hallway will be down at 0000 hours for scheduled maintenance. Take my card. Come to Sublevel B. End of the main corridor, through the double doors.

– H

Something else slipped from the fold, landing beside her leg with a soft tap.

A key card. White, with the lab’s logo and an orderly clearance strip along the bottom.

Henry’s.

Her breath stuttered.

She read the note again. Then a third time, just to be sure she wasn’t hallucinating.

“Sublevel B,” she whispered.

The basement.

She glanced up at the corner of her room. Red camera light, still on. Watching.

She folded the note back in on itself, slid both note and card under her mattress, and forced herself to lie back, eyes on the ceiling.

She waited.

Ticking. Humming. The slow movement of shadows under the door.

When the lights finally clicked to night cycle and the soft chime signaled curfew, she jolted.

She rolled onto her side, eyes on the clock above the door. The clock she once begged Papa to know what it meant or does and how to read it.

11:56.

Her heart started beating faster.

11:58.

She swung her legs over the bed, fingers feeling blindly for the edge of the mattress. The paper crinkled under her hand. The cool plastic of the key card slid into her palm.

11:59.

The red camera light in the corner blinked once.

Twice.

Then went dark.

Right on time.

She exhaled slowly, like she’d been holding that breath for hours.

“Okay,” she whispered to herself. “Okay, okay…”

She slipped off the bed, landing as silently as she could. She padded to the door and pressed her ear against it.

Nothing.

Her thumb slid the card through the panel beside the handle.

For half a heartbeat, she thought it wouldn’t work.

Then: beep. A soft click.

The lock disengaged.

She cracked the door an inch, peered out.

The hallway was dim and empty, lit by that eerie blue night-light glow. The cameras along the ceiling were dark, lenses still.

Her pulse roared in her ears.

She slipped out, closed the door behind her, and started walking.

Bare feet. Soft steps. The card clutched tightly in her hand.

Sublevel B.

She’d never been down there.

She reached the double doors at the end of the main hall, quickly swiping Henry’s key card.

For a second, nothing.

Then the quiet beep with a light changing to green to signal it was unlocked.

She pushed through one ands immediately took a left, stepping down a few small flight of stairs.

At the very end of the corridor, two double doors loomed. No windows. Not even a keypad or a swipe slot. Just a simple unlocked door.

She gently turned the handle, slowly pushing the door open and quickly stepping inside.

The basement still smelled like dust and cold metal when she slipped through the double doors.

Henry was already there.

Quick. Controlled. Like he couldn’t afford to hesitate.

The door whispered shut behind her.

“Easy,” he murmured, quieter this time, guiding her into a darker corner between two shelving units. “If someone comes down here—”

He released her immediately, like he’d caught himself.

The loss of it made her chest tighten in a way she hated.

Henry’s gaze swept her face, then her shoulders, then lower, quick and clinical at first… until it wasn’t.

He saw the bruises.

The way her breath caught when she shifted. The faint swelling along her forearm.

His expression tightened with something sharp and quiet.

“I heard what you did,” he said, voice low. “The power outage. The guards.”

She tried to shrug and immediately regretted it, wincing when pain sparked in her ribs.

“Yeah,” she managed. “I really went for the dramatic lighting.”

That ghost of humor flickered in his eyes then disappeared.

“I’m proud,” Henry said simply.

It hit her harder than anything Brenner had done.

Her throat tightened and she looked down so he wouldn’t see it.

“You shouldn’t be,” she muttered. “I almost failed.”

“But you didn’t,” he corrected. “You listened. You adapted. You used the room instead of fighting it.” His voice softened. “You survived.”

She didn’t answer.

Henry noticed her staring.

His fingers, still at his sides, flexed slightly like he wanted to do something and didn’t know if he was allowed.

“What?” he asked quietly.

She blinked, heat creeping up her neck.

“Nothing,” she said too fast.

He tilted his head the smallest amount, studying her like he always did except this time it didn’t feel like observation. It felt like he was trying to understand something delicate.

“You’re doing it again,” he murmured.

“Doing what?”

“Looking at me like I’m—” He stopped himself, jaw tightening, eyes flicking away. “Never mind.”

Her heart stuttered.

She swallowed and forced her voice to steady. “I… didn’t think you’d be here.”

“I said I needed to see you,” he replied, eyes back on her now. “And I meant it.”

Silence settled between them, thick as the shadows around the shelves.

Henry’s gaze caught on it.

He stared for a beat too long.

Then, carefully, he lifted his hand.

Slow. Like he was approaching a wild animal that might bolt.

“Hold still,” he said, voice so quiet it almost didn’t exist.

Her breath caught anyway.

She nodded once, barely.

His fingers brushed the loose strand, light, cautious—tucking it back behind her ear. His knuckles skimmed the side of her face, hovering over the bruise without pressing into it.

It wasn’t even the touch itself that made her feel unsteady.

It was the gentleness.

The fact that he was careful.

That he was acting like she was something that could be hurt… and mattered enough not to.

Her eyelids fluttered involuntarily, the smallest reaction she couldn’t stop, and she hated how obvious it felt. She hated how her body leaned into the warmth before her mind could catch up.

Henry’s hand stilled.

His eyes darkened slightly, as if he’d noticed too.

“Your hair,” he murmured, swallowing. “It’s—”

“Mine,” she whispered, the word coming out sharper than she meant. Then softer, like an admission, “They never took it.”

He lowered his hand slowly. “They stopped trying.”

“They thought I wasn’t worth it.”

Henry’s jaw tightened. “They were wrong.”

Her throat burned.

Another strand slipped loose as she shifted, and the messy tie at the nape of her neck sagged. She reached back to fix it and hissed when her shoulder protested.

Henry’s gaze flicked to her hand, then to her face.

“You can’t lift your arm,” he observed.

“I can,” she lied.

He didn’t argue.

He just stepped closer, close enough that the air changed, close enough that she could feel the heat of him in the cold basement.

“I’ll do it,” he said.

Her stomach flipped.

“You don’t have to,” she whispered.

“I want to,” he replied, so quietly it felt like it wasn’t meant to be heard.

She turned slightly, giving him access, and the movement made her ribs ache. She bit down on her lip to keep from making a sound.

Henry’s hands hovered for a second behind her head, as if he was asking permission without words.

Then his fingers slid into her hair.

Gentle. Careful. He gathered it slowly, smoothing it back as though he was afraid of pulling too hard, as though he could feel every bruise under her skin with his fingertips.

She stared straight ahead, hands clenched lightly in her lap because she didn’t trust them not to reach back for him.

She didn’t trust herself not to turn into the touch.

He froze.

“Sorry,” he murmured.

“Don’t,” she whispered immediately. “Don’t be sorry.”

His hands stayed there for another beat, warm at the nape of her neck.

Then he finished, fingers lingering like he forgot what to do with them when there was no task left.

When he finally stepped back, she turned to face him again, hair neatly secured.

He looked… different. Not softer exactly, he was still Henry, still controlled but like something in him had shifted, pulled slightly out of place.

As if he’d just done something forbidden.

“You look…” he started.

“Less like a disaster?” she offered, trying to make it a joke.

His lips twitched. “Less like you were dragged through a combat chamber.”

“That’s one way to put it.”

His eyes moved over her face again, then down to her arm, where the bruise darkened.

“Let me see,” he murmured.

She didn’t look away this time. “I’m fine,” she lied again, because she didn’t want him to see her as fragile.

Henry’s gaze lifted, steady, unblinking.

“You don’t have to be fine with me,” he said.

The words loosened something inside her chest that she’d been holding too tight.

She swallowed, voice quiet. “You shouldn’t do things like this.”

“Like what?”

“Care.”

A flicker of something, sad, bitter, crossed his face.

“I’ve already been punished for it,” he said, voice flat. “It’s too late to pretend I don’t.”

Her pulse thundered.

She stared at him, at the sharp line of his jaw, the dark fall of his lashes, the way the low light made him look carved out of shadow and glass.

And before she could stop herself, her voice came out in a whisper that felt like truth: “Thank you.”

Henry’s eyes held hers. The air between them went tight.

“For what?” he asked, though he knew.

“For seeing me,” she said. “For… not letting them erase me. For coming back.”

His throat bobbed as he swallowed.

“Always,” he murmured, and the word sounded like a promise he didn’t have the right to make.

Footsteps echoed faintly somewhere far above, just a distant sound down the corridor, maybe a guard passing, maybe nothing.

Henry’s body shifted instantly, alert, all instinct.

He stepped closer again, not touching her this time but placing himself between her and the door, his voice a whisper.

“We need to get you back,” he said.

She nodded, but she didn’t move right away.

Not because she was stubborn.

Because her body felt warmer than it had in months, and the cold basement air suddenly seemed unbearable.

Henry watched her for a beat, eyes narrowing slightly, as if he could read the war inside her: the need to stay, the fear of getting caught.

His gaze softened just a fraction. “Come on,” he murmured, and this time when he reached for her wrist, his fingers didn’t clamp down like before.

They rested there. Steady. Gentle.

Long enough for her to breathe.

Then he guided her toward the door and back into the humming belly of the lab, two shadows moving through the dark, carrying a secret warmth that the cameras would never understand.

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