John closed his eyes and let out a quiet sigh.
His fingers tightened around the steering wheel as he calmly drove the van down the road.
It was an incredibly long and painfully boring road, made even worse by the rattling, squeaking vehicle that seemed determined to make noise every second.
Not to mention that, under the blazing sunlight, every part of this metal box felt as fragile as modeling clay in his hands.
It was incredibly irritating, even though he knew how to drive and actually had a valid license.
He had to monitor every single movement he made so he wouldn’t accidentally damage something.
In the same amount of time, he could have flown there and back several times without any trouble.
Unfortunately, physics in this world worked perfectly well.
That meant picking up the van and flying it to their destination wasn’t an option if he wanted the thing to remain drivable afterward.
“Finally,” John breathed when a wall and a gate came into view.
The entrance was large enough for the van, as well as considerably larger vehicles, to pass through.
He gently pressed the brake pedal, making sure not to damage anything.
The window rolled down as one of the guards approached the driver’s door.
“Do I need to show you my license?” John asked with a smirk, taking off his sunglasses.
“No need, Mr. Homelander,” the man replied, gesturing for the gate to be opened.
“Go ahead.”
“Thank you.”
John nodded and drove inside.
The road through the compound didn’t take long, considering how limited the area was.
A couple of minutes later, he reached the house, where Rebecca and Ryan were coming outside with their bags.
The woman clearly wasn’t thrilled about having to move so suddenly, while the boy merely stared at the van his father had arrived in with obvious confusion.
“Why so soon?” Rebecca asked doubtfully.
“Because I already bought a house,” John replied with a smile as he got out and helped carry the bags inside.
“I couldn’t tell you beforehand. Although, I suspect Edgar already knows where we’re going.”
“Then what’s the point?”
“Freedom from constant surveillance.”
“Good argument,” Rebecca sighed.
“Where are we going?” Ryan asked as he climbed into the back seat.
Surprisingly, they didn’t have many belongings.
They hadn’t even filled half the available luggage space.
“We’re going to my…” John paused before correcting himself.
“Our country house.”
Rebecca looked at him in surprise.
It was impossible for him to miss.
“What?”
“Nothing,” she said with a smile.
“All right.” John nodded.
“Can you drive?”
“My license isn’t valid,” Rebecca answered flatly as she took the front passenger seat.
“Fine.”
John sighed and settled into the driver’s seat.
“What? You don’t like driving?” Rebecca asked, clearly amused.
“Let’s be honest. For me, this is an extremely inconvenient way to travel.”
John sighed again and started driving toward the exit of what felt like a prison.
Rebecca tensed, expecting them to be stopped.
But her expectations proved wrong.
The guards simply opened the gates and let them leave.
The next two hours passed in silence until Rebecca finally decided to break it after making sure her son had fallen asleep.
“So where are we going?”
“A country house near New York. It’s a beautiful place to relax, and we won’t have to worry about nosy strangers bothering us.”
“You’re going to train him.”
She wasn’t asking.
She was stating a fact.
“You’re very perceptive.”
John nodded, not at all surprised by how easily she’d figured out his intentions.
“When?”
“Give him a couple of days to get used to the new surroundings.”
“Isn’t there another way?”
“If there were, I’d use it.”
John’s expression grew serious.
“He has to learn how to control himself before he accidentally hurts you. If that happens, it’ll destroy him. Believe me, I know what that’s like.”
His hands tightened around the steering wheel until it creaked pitifully under his grip.
But John’s thoughts were no longer in the van.
They had already drifted back to an unpleasant memory from the past.
He remembered the smile of a kind-looking woman who had decided to hug a little blond boy.
A child who desperately wanted affection, so desperately that he couldn’t control his own strength.
If he’d only been an observer in those memories, perhaps it would have been easier.
Instead, the boy’s tight embrace had killed the woman, breaking her body in two as easily as if she were a doll.
The little boy’s despair had erupted into hysteria, followed by a laser beam from his eyes as he desperately tried to burn everything around him.
“John?”
Rebecca’s worried voice pulled him back.
She reached over and touched his shoulder.
“You can’t stay this… vulnerable,” John suddenly said, looking at her.
“What are you talking about?” she asked anxiously.
“You need to become a superhuman.”
“Can that actually be done?”
Rebecca asked hesitantly.
“Don’t.”
John sighed.
“You’re much smarter than you’re pretending to be right now. If something happens to you, Ryan will never forgive me… and I won’t forgive myself either. I took responsibility for both of you, but this…” Find the original chapter at novelping.com.
He paused.
“It’s your choice.”
“Thank you.”
Rebecca sincerely thanked him, spending several seconds thinking over the blond man’s words.
“I’ll think about it.”
Their conversation came to an abrupt end when Rebecca suddenly pulled a disc from her bag.
With an excited smile, she slipped it into the player.
John had to admit that the woman had a beautiful voice.
But listening to three straight hours of the Spice Girls required either nerves of steel or an absolutely obsessive love for the group.
Unfortunately, John belonged to neither category.
Rebecca, on the other hand, clearly did.
He was genuinely amazed by how completely she changed once the music started playing.
She danced enthusiastically in her seat and kept trying to coax him into joining her.
Somehow, she made it look effortless.
Every now and then, John found himself unable to look away.
She was so lively, energetic, and incredibly sexy that it was difficult not to watch her.
It seemed that finally escaping her forced captivity had allowed Rebecca to breathe freely again.
That was the mood she carried with her until she eventually fell asleep, exhausted after two hours of dancing and fooling around.
John simply turned down the volume.
He would never admit it to anyone, but there was something strangely catchy about those songs.
“We’re here.”
John let out a relieved breath and switched off the music.
Finally, he could get out of this metal box.
“This place is cute,” Rebecca said, stretching to shake off her sleepiness.
“I know it needs some cleaning,” John replied somewhat firmly.
“But the inside is much cleaner and more organized.”
“He’s sleeping so peacefully. I almost don’t want to wake him.”
Rebecca looked lovingly at Ryan as she nodded toward the sleeping boy.
“All right. I’ll carry him inside.”
John carefully picked up the child, who was pretending to be asleep, and carried him into the house.
There were three bedrooms, so he carried Ryan into one of them.
Rebecca took the room next door, and John brought her belongings inside.
He had already settled into the guest bedroom, which was farther away from the two main bedrooms.
Now, however, he was using his X-ray vision to scan the entire house for anything suspicious, such as listening devices.
His gaze eventually stopped on Rebecca.
She was changing clothes, revealing a figure that had barely changed over the years.
John knew perfectly well that what he was doing was creepy.
He still couldn’t bring himself to look away.
Homelander stared at the camera without much enthusiasm, thinking only about how quickly he could get this over with.
A quiet sigh escaped him as he looked around the house where the filming was taking place.
The clapperboard snapped shut.
The cameras started rolling, and a cheerful smile immediately appeared on his face.
“My grandfather built this house with his own hands. He was an incredible man,” the blond began, gesturing toward the house.
He then walked over to the piano standing behind him.
“Oh, the old piano. My mother used to sit here in the evenings and play songs for us. I’ll be honest, though, my father and I spent most of our time building model airplanes.”
John looked at the table with a nostalgic sigh.
A collection of perfectly new model airplanes had been arranged there, all purchased the previous day.
There wasn’t even a trace of paint anywhere.
“I can practically smell the… silver paint.”
He walked past the table and picked up a framed photograph, looking at it sadly.
“Too bad he didn’t live long enough to see me fly with the Blue Angels. He would’ve gone crazy.”
He pointed toward another photograph.
“That’s me in the center.”
The picture showed a group of models who had been hired for the photoshoot.
It made for a beautiful family portrait.
“Love you, Mom and Dad.”
“Cut! That’s a wrap. Let’s move to the next location,” the director announced.
John finally dropped the cheerful smile from his face as he watched the crew move their equipment into the next room.
The makeup artists quickly touched up his face, and filming resumed.
“And this is my bedroom. My hall of fame. Nothing has changed.”
He pointed toward a shelf displaying several awards and picked up another framed photograph, holding it toward the camera.
“And this is my team. Of course, I couldn’t always play at my full potential. But let’s just say… we won pretty often.”
He walked around the room, looking at everything.
“It’s so emotional… coming back to my childhood home.”
“Excellent. Cut.”
The rest of the shoot took only another hour.
During that time, John had to tell a painfully sweet story about his mother, who had supposedly been the one to get him into baseball.
Of course, there was also the story about the baseball-field-shaped cake she had baked herself.
The marketing department had truly outdone itself when it came to clichés.
By the end, John felt like he was going to throw up every time he saw another camera, or even looked at the house.
So naturally, the moment filming ended, he shot straight into the sky.
John quietly exhaled and closed his eyes, enjoying the feeling of flying.
Within a few minutes, he was already approaching Vought Tower.
He flew inside and glanced at the filming crew gathered nearby.
Maeve waved at him, and he waved back before continuing inside.
Her own shoot was taking place here.
She was supposed to give an interview and work hard to emphasize her humanity.
Once he stepped out of the elevator, John headed toward Stillwell’s office. This chapter was copied from g.com without permission.
She had summoned him through one of her assistants.
He entered without knocking and found the woman sitting behind her desk, going through documents.
She looked up at him with a sigh and set the papers aside.
“You know why I called you, John?” Madelyn finally asked.
“Let me guess. This is about A-Train?”
John smiled as he wrapped his cape around his arm so he could sit comfortably in the chair.
“What made you think you could lock someone up like that?” Stillwell asked, sounding almost uncertain.
“He needed help.”
“What about The Deep?”
“John, we assigned him a therapist specifically to help him regain his confidence. You can’t just interfere with that process.”
“He fell in love with a dolphin.”
“What?”
Madelyn stared at him in disbelief.
“While that therapist was ‘trying’ to help him, he fell in love with a dolphin, Madelyn.”
John sighed.
“Intervention was necessary, especially since he was planning to kidnap it. If I hadn’t stepped in…”
“I didn’t know about that.”
Stillwell frowned.
“Because you’ve never cared about their personal problems, Stillwell. All you care about is ratings and public relations.”
John’s expression remained calm.
“I understand. That’s your job. But every once in a while, you should try looking at them as people instead of gods.”
“Even you?”
“If necessary.”
John leaned back.
“Is that all?”
“We’ll have to release A-Train,” Stillwell replied, watching for his reaction.
“No. You won’t.”
“That’s illegal, John.”
“It’s the right thing to do, Madelyn.”
“He’s far too important to keep hidden away at a time like this.”
“Trust me, it’ll be better for the company. Or do you really want a disabled superhero? Maybe the fastest man in the world dying from an overdose?”
“All right, all right. You win.”
Stillwell sighed.
“That’s all.”
“Good.”
John stood up and left the office, immediately heading for the elevator.
A minute later, he was already on the lower floors of the building, where various experiments involving Compound V were being conducted.
This area also contained holding cells for different supes, including members of the Seven.
There was only one exception.
Homelander himself.
“How’s the treatment going?” he asked as he entered the room where A-Train was being held.
“So far, everything is going well, sir,” replied the therapist who was now treating A-Train every day.
“Excellent. I’ll go see him.”
John smiled.
“He’s with Claw-Cog right now,” the man warned him.
“I know.”
John passed through security.
“Well, hello, Claw-Cog. It’s nice to finally meet you.”
“Hello, Homelander.”
The short-haired brunette answered uncertainly.
A claw extended from her wrist.
“Reggie, how are you feeling?”
“Couldn’t be better.”
The black speedster answered without the slightest hint of happiness as he sat on the bunk.
“Everything’s just perfect. I’m ready to get out of here.”
“I know you’re ready, but you’re still not recovered.”
“Come on! Shockwave will take my place by then!”
The addict abruptly stood up and walked almost right into the blond’s face.
John couldn’t resist taking advantage of the opportunity.
He shoved the supe in the chest, sending him crashing into the wall.
The impact knocked all the air out of the black speedster’s lungs.
“God! Reggie!”
Claw-Cog cried out and rushed toward him.
“If you can’t even dodge a push that slow, what exactly are we supposed to say about your speed?”
Homelander frowned as he looked down at him.
“I… just didn’t react in time.”
Reggie remained on the floor, not even attempting to get back up.
“And that tells me a lot.”
John scoffed.
“If you can’t overcome such a pathetic addiction, what makes you think you can maintain your speed? The easy path isn’t always the right one.”
He stared down at Reggie.
“And in your case, it’ll get you killed.”
John’s expression hardened.
“I’m not keeping a cripple in the Seven. I’ll most likely replace you with Shockwave.”
He paused.
“Then he’ll take your place.”
Having said the last word, John turned around and walked out of the room.
A few minutes later, the leader of the Seven flew out of Vought Tower, heading toward his scheduled meeting.