In Pop Claw's apartment, the air still stank with death, fear, and sex.
Right now, through her fear-blurred and retina-burned vision, the thing in front of her looked ten thousand times more terrifying than any demon straight out of hell.
The threat of death clamped down on her heart like cold iron tongs.
She was pinned against the cold wall by Ryan's grip on her throat. That total power gap made all her struggling look weak and fucking pathetic.
Her proud claws, sharp enough to shred steel plates, couldn't even leave a single scratch on his skin.
"I… I'll tell you… please, don't kill me, I'll tell you everything…"
Pop Claw was completely broken by that angelic yet demonic little face.
Under the choking fear of death, she spilled everything without holding back. Shaking and babbling, she gave up the secret channel she and A-Train used to get Compound V.
It was an underground trading network inside Vought. A sidelined genetic lab employee, using a fake church group called "Light of Dawn," secretly sold high-purity Compound V to supes who needed extra to get high.
Once he had the information he wanted, Ryan's innocent-looking face didn't change at all.
He listened quietly, like a good student paying attention in class.
Pop Claw thought she saw a chance to live. She used her last bit of strength to beg.
"I… I only know this much… please, just let me go…"
Ryan looked at her with those ice-blue eyes, completely flat.
He gave a small nod, like he accepted her cooperation.
Then his freezing voice slid into her ear.
"Actually, it doesn't matter if you told me or not. I would've found out even if I killed you first."
Pop Claw's eyes shot wide open in terror!
Before she could react, Ryan's hand clamped down hard on her neck.
Crack!
A sharp snap of breaking bone rang out.
Her slender neck crumpled easily in his grip.
The last spark of life in her eyes died instantly, replaced by empty darkness.
[Plunder successful! Target 'Pop Claw'.]
[Obtained: Retractable Claws, Superhuman Strength...]
Ryan felt a small trickle of power flow into his body. He curled his lip in disdain.
For him this shit was barely worth anything. Just a fucking dessert.
His real prize was that secret trading network. Well, I can at least cosplay as the Wolverine.
He let go. Pop Claw's still-warm, limp corpse slid down the wall like a bag of trash.
Time to clean up.
Ryan went to work on the slaughterhouse apartment with ice-cold efficiency.
First he used the super speed he'd just stolen from A-Train and grabbed the two biggest designer suitcases in the place, both big enough to hold an adult.
Then, without expression, he brutally stuffed the slowly cooling bodies of A-Train and Pop Claw inside, treating them like two worthless sacks of meat.
Once that was done, he focused. His body started changing again.
Bones stretched, muscles swelled. In just a few seconds he transformed back into the exact appearance of A-Train, the man he had killed minutes ago.
He walked over to the big dressing mirror in the bedroom, stared at the arrogant Black face in the reflection, and nodded in satisfaction.
He picked up the two heavy suitcases, one in each hand, and turned into a blue lightning bolt that was almost impossible to see.
He vanished from the apartment instantly.
...
Zzzt!
A few minutes later, high above a pitch-black stretch of deep ocean far from New York City.
Ryan appeared out of thin air.
He casually tossed the two massive suitcases into the freezing, dark, bottomless sea below.
The suitcases, the bodies, and all their secrets sank silently and disappeared forever.
He hovered over the water, staring at the distant lights of New York sparkling like a sea of stars.
He knew tomorrow was the big race. The one the whole world was waiting for. The century race between A-Train and Shockwave.
A cruel smile that belonged only to Ryan curved at the corner of his mouth.
He planned to do it right when the entire planet was watching.
In front of billions of viewers, he would "accidentally" eliminate Shockwave in the most spectacular, shocking, and fucked-up way possible.
Not only would he plunder another powerful speed ability, probably from the same source as A-Train's.
He would also do his convenient old man a favor by easing the pressure from suddenly losing three members of The Seven.
...
At the same time, inside Vought Tower, in Madelyn's office.
The atmosphere was suffocating.
The news that three members of The Seven had died on the same day hit like a nuke ready to blow. Madelyn used her highest authority to lock it down tight.
To the outside world, they rushed out an emergency PR statement claiming The Deep, Starlight, and Translucent were overseas on a "top-secret counter-terrorism mission" and couldn't appear for now.
That lie might fool regular people, but it sure as shit wasn't fooling the sharp-eyed shareholders and high-level execs inside the company.
A worse, more immediate crisis stared them all in the face.
Tomorrow was A-Train's Century Race. The day after was the already-announced media event for the new members.
The Seven was Vought's most valuable product and core asset.
They could not show up to the public with a broken lineup.
Under crushing pressure, Madelyn and the senior executives had no choice but to trigger the highest-level emergency plan. They started scrambling for replacement members to plug the holes.
It was a desperate, chaotic move.
First up was Lamplighter.
The former Seven member who got forced into "retirement" years ago after an "accident" was dragged back from the secret mental hospital called Sage Center out in the suburbs.
Everyone knew the guy's brain was fried, but right now they were willing to try anything just to hold things together until a better replacement showed up.
Second was Blindspot.
A blind combat specialist who had still been on the candidate list waiting for evaluation.
Even though he couldn't see, his hearing was insane and he moved like lightning. In this emergency they fast-tracked him, skipping every single procedure.
And most important of all was that woman.
"Stormfront."
That hundred-year-old hag whose strength was off the charts, whose ideology was stuck in the fucking Stone Age, and who was literally older than Vought's founder, got dragged out of retirement and invited back into The Seven.
Vought wanted to use her legendary status and raw power—second only to Homelander—to steady the ship and keep everyone from panicking.
Madelyn stared at the profiles of these emergency replacements on her computer screen and felt a migraine splitting her skull open.
She knew this so-called "New Seven" was a fucking disaster waiting to happen. Full of conflicts and unstable as hell.
Lamplighter was mentally unstable as shit.
Stormfront's backwards, conservative bullshit didn't fit modern times at all.
And that new guy, Blindspot…
She could only hope he didn't get murdered by Homelander on his first fucking day.
This wasn't a team. It was a goddamn powder keg.
...
While Vought's top brass scrambled in total chaos over the sudden crisis,
Ryan, wearing A-Train's face, quietly slipped back into A-Train's flashy luxury suite.
The place was plastered with narcissistic posters, shelves of trophies, and rows of overpriced sneakers.
He dropped onto the massive soft bed, closed his eyes, and got comfortable.
He was going to sleep like a baby.
Then tomorrow, in front of the whole world, he would wipe out Shockwave and walk away clean.
And fuck Vought's reputation straight into the ground while he was at it.
"Heh, I can't wait to see their expressions."