The full-length mirror in front of me reflected the crooked grin on my face.
It was caused more by awkwardness than by any real understanding of what was happening.
After all, standing in front of me was a tall, muscular blond man with blue eyes, straight teeth, and a perfectly symmetrical face.
A true Aryan, if there ever was one.
Add a blue suit, a long cape styled after the American flag, and, of course, yellow shoulder pads shaped like eagles resting on each shoulder, along with a matching belt buckle.
And there you have it, the most famous superhero image in the whole damn world.
The local Superman, in every sense of the word.
The only thing missing was a pair of red underwear over the suit, but that wasn’t important right now.
Homelander was the strongest superhero in this bizarre world.
The kind of man who could be called perfect, a superhuman without flaws.
He was supposedly an alien, born on a distant dying world.
As an infant, he had been placed inside a rocket and sent from his home planet to Earth before the planet exploded.
He eventually reached Earth and landed in the United States, where he was discovered by an elderly couple.
They named him John and raised him according to the highest and purest American values: patriotism, altruism, and respect for truth and justice.
Then, when his powers manifested, John decided to protect his new home and became Homelander, the most powerful and righteous superhero the world had ever known.
A beautiful legend.
It had served as Homelander’s backstory in the comics and later in the movies.
It was obviously ripped off from Superman, Kal-El, but in this world, no such character had ever existed in any form.
So technically, it was plagiarism on a multiversal scale.
Very few people knew the truth, though.
John, as his creator had named him, had literally been raised in a controlled environment.
In case he ever attempted to escape, a hydrogen bomb had been attached to him as a child.
At the same time, he had been taught exactly how he was supposed to behave in public.
They created the myth of Homelander, the greatest hero in history, who would lead the greatest superhero team in the world, known as the Seven.
A sort of Justice League or Avengers, where the greatest heroes on Earth had been gathered together.
And, as you might have guessed, there were seven of them.
The team had its own black speedster, a Batman cosplayer, an Aquaman parody who actually sucked this time around, and its very own Invisible Man.
There was also a Wonder Woman of sorts, with Superman being represented by yours truly.
And every single one of them had received their abilities at the whim of the only company that monopolized the superhero industry, Vought International.
An American multibillion-dollar corporation currently headed by Stan Edgar.
They produced movies, television shows, comics, and merchandise based on their own superheroes.
Homelander had been created by them.
Literally created and raised according to their plans.
But that raised an important question.
Who was I, then, if I didn’t identify myself with Homelander?
A simple cameraman who had been trying to make ends meet.
An ordinary, completely unremarkable man with equally ordinary desires.
At least, that had been the case until recently.
Waking up in bed wearing this ridiculous suit, one my predecessor apparently rarely took off, had been quite the surprise.
What could I say?
The body didn’t sweat, which already eliminated a whole host of inconveniences that came with wearing the suit constantly.
I felt slightly bewildered when I realized that I knew everything Homelander knew.
His entire memory was inside my head.
Everything from his childhood memories in the laboratory to what he had eaten most recently was now part of my own mind.
And standing there in front of the mirror, I had absolutely no idea what I had gotten myself into or who was responsible for all of this.
Going to sleep as an overweight ordinary man and waking up as the ideal of perfection in the eyes of most people.
What could possibly be better?
Only, whoever had given me this gift might very well expect payment in return.
Somehow, I couldn’t believe it had all been given to me for free.
“I need some fresh air,” I muttered, taking several steps toward the door.
Then I suddenly stopped and turned toward the spacious balcony.
A balcony that was conveniently perfect for…
Flying.
“Why not?”
A few seconds later, I was standing on the balcony, swallowing thickly as I stared down at the asphalt below.
As far as Homelander’s memories told me, there were at least eighty floors in this building.
He lived on the seventieth.
Which was definitely not what anyone would call low.
If I couldn’t fly and fell, I could turn some poor passerby or a car into a pancake.
As for me, not much could happen.
At worst, my ratings might drop.
And even that wouldn’t be much of a problem.
Vought would make sure news of such an incident never made it outside the company.
I exhaled and released the railing.
The metal had bent slightly under the strength of my grip.
My eyes closed on their own as I focused on the sensation of the wind hitting my face.
I raised my arms, bent my knees slightly, then suddenly pushed them down and jumped.
My legs practically launched me into the sky.
My body followed effortlessly.
I opened my eyes and watched as the night sky rushed toward me, or rather, as my body rushed toward the sky.
My heart was pounding like crazy, while my speed continued to increase.
My hands instinctively stretched forward, fingers curling into fists.
My speed increased even more.
Then, with a thunderous crack, my body broke through the sound barrier.
A couple of seconds later, I noticed a layer of ice forming over my red gloves.
Yet my body didn’t feel the slightest bit cold.
Instead, I felt an overwhelming urge to keep going.
I knew this wasn’t my limit.
Not even close.
So I accelerated again, reaching my maximum speed.
A few seconds later, the ice disappeared, along with every sound around me.
Flying became much easier.
I gradually came to a stop.
My breathing remained steady, even though there was no air to breathe in the stratosphere.
It was probably better to chalk that up to the peculiarities of a superhero’s physiology rather than waste time thinking about it.
I slowly turned around and looked down at the city.
There wasn’t a cloud or anything else obstructing my enhanced vision.
Combined with my X-ray vision, it allowed me to see the entire city in breathtaking detail.
The possibilities were incredible.
It felt as though the entire city was nothing more than a toy construction set that I could easily take apart piece by piece.
And that was exactly what frightened me.
Still, I had to admit…
“This is fucking awesome!”
Only then did I realize that my eyes were glowing red.
The faint reddish tint spreading through my surroundings made that pretty obvious.
Up here, I felt like a fish in water.
I’d been worried that I would have to relearn how to use these abilities, but apparently, that wasn’t necessary at all.
A smile remained plastered across my face as I gazed down at the city from a height no bird could ever hope to reach.
With those glowing red eyes, I probably looked pretty damn ominous from the ground.
I landed smoothly on the balcony and calmly walked back into the spacious apartment.
There was nothing excessive about the place.
Nothing had changed since Homelander had moved in.
Although there was one new addition on the desk: a framed photograph of Stillwell standing beside him.
The completely fake smiles they wore in the picture only irritated me now, rather than filling me with the nostalgia they once had.
“What did he ever see in her?” I muttered, staring at the younger version of the blonde woman.
She wasn’t that much younger, though.
She’d already had wrinkles back then, even if expensive cosmetics had done a good job of hiding them.
I picked up the frame and looked at it for barely a second before casually dropping it straight into the trash.
I felt absolutely nothing about it.
I simply shrugged and collapsed into the chair.
I leaned my head back and stared at the white ceiling, letting out a quiet breath as I pushed away the unnecessary worries occupying my mind.
It was better to deal with problems when they appeared instead of trembling in fear at every little noise.
A knock at the door caught me off guard.
So did the fact that someone opened it without waiting for permission.
A blonde woman calmly walked into the apartment.
As always, her clothes were practical yet stylish.
Twenty years ago, she had been quite the bombshell.
Not anymore.
“Homelander,” Madelyn said with a smile when she saw me sitting in the chair.
“Madelyn.”
I gave her an indifferent nod.
I had no desire to talk to this woman.
If Homelander had practically been obsessed with her, I felt absolutely nothing toward her.
My predecessor had understood perfectly well that she was taking full advantage of his feelings and attachment.
Personally, I found that kind of treatment completely unacceptable.
“I thought you were going to help Maeve with those robbers today,” Madelyn said, stopping several meters away from me.
“But you were gone all day, so I started to worry.”
“You started to worry?”
I smiled, barely managing to suppress the laughter threatening to escape.
There was a reason I’d compared Homelander to Superman.
He literally possessed all of the Kryptonian’s abilities.
The only exception was his inability to freeze things with his breath.
Presumably, even a nuclear explosion wouldn’t be enough to hurt me.
So hearing someone claim to be worried about me when that person knew perfectly well what I was capable of sounded almost like a joke.
What I hadn’t realized was that I’d spent the entire day in the sky.
Let’s put it this way: flying was incredible.
Maybe skydiving enthusiasts would understand the feeling.
For me, though, it was more like swimming when you simply didn’t want to leave the water.
And since I could easily ignore hunger, I had spent hours flying without even noticing the passage of time.
“She managed without me?”
I asked the question while seeing not even the slightest trace of concern on her face over my unusual behavior.
The same professional smile as always.
“You know she’s a professional,” Madelyn replied without changing her expression.
“Wonderful. Good for her,” I said with a smile.
“I assume there won’t be any more questions for me?”
“No,” Stillwell replied.
For just a moment, a hint of concern appeared in her eyes.
“But her rating increased less than it would have if Homelander had been there with her.”
“That’s a shame,” I said indifferently, staring directly into her eyes.
I could see her pulse quicken.
She was afraid of me.
“Maybe I could accompany her on another assignment?”
“You mean Starlight?” the woman asked, clearly surprised by my initiative.
“Yes. That’s happening tonight, right?”
“Deep has already volunteered…”
“I think I can persuade him otherwise. Be a dear and send me the script I’m supposed to read.”
I stood up from the chair and took a couple of steps toward her.
“So?”
Fear.
I could see it in her eyes, hear it in her heartbeat, even see it in her trembling knees.
Homelander had never allowed himself to see that.
He didn’t want to destroy the illusion that this woman cared about him.
I, on the other hand, had been completely indifferent to her from the beginning.
That made it much easier to see right through her.
“I’ll talk to Deep myself,” Stillwell said with a smile as she headed toward the door.
I should probably have admired her ability to hide her emotions.
Only…
“By the way, how’s Teddy?”
She froze.
She was standing there with one hand on the doorknob.
One second.
Then another.
She quietly exhaled, careful not to let herself appear vulnerable in front of me.
“He’s doing wonderfully. He’s already started crawling on all fours,” Madelyn replied without turning around.
“Good for him…”
The oppressive silence began to weigh heavily on the woman, who couldn’t even see my face.
I had the power to instill genuine terror in her, enough to make her think twice about trying to use me for her own purposes.
For now, though, this was enough.
“See you around, Madelyn.”
“See you, Homelander.”
Her voice was relatively calm as she walked out the door.
Only after leaving did she let out a relieved breath.
For several seconds, she simply stood there, trying to steady her breathing.
Then she cast a wary glance back at the door.
After adjusting her hair, she turned around and headed toward her office.
“All I’m missing is some popcorn or chips.”
I muttered thoughtfully as I watched Stillwell disappear down the corridor.
Still, I couldn’t deny that she had an impressive amount of strength of character.
That was almost enough to earn my admiration.
Just a little.