“Doctor.”
“It’s my turn to go on.”
“The lines they wrote are so dull. What do you think my first words should be to make sure everyone remembers today?”
Homelander’s voice came clearly through Lynn’s earpiece over a separate, encrypted channel.
His tone was dripping with disdain for the clichés churned out by Vought’s PR department, mixed with anticipation for Lynn—the only one who truly understood him.
In the command center, Ashley was still screaming her lungs out, conducting the final countdown.
“All units, pay attention! Drone camera three, get ready! Give Mr. Homelander a perfect close-up from behind! The moment he lands, he needs to deliver our main slogan: ‘Hope is with you’!”
Lynn glanced at the high-spirited figure on the screen, his lips curving into a cold arc.
Instead of answering Homelander’s question directly, he chose a more provocative approach, stoking the flames of Homelander’s vanity.
“The lines they gave you are meant for a ‘superhero,'” Lynn said, his voice calm yet deeply seductive.
“Any idiot with a cape who can fly can say those words.”
“But you are not them.”
A brief silence fell on Homelander’s end.
Through his super-hearing, Lynn caught the slight shift in the rhythm of Homelander’s heartbeat.
His interest had been piqued.
“What are you getting at?” Homelander asked.
“The audience doesn’t need to watch another trailer for *The Seven Assemble*,” Lynn continued.
“What they want to see is a god. A god who can make choices entirely different from mortals, from Vought, and even from the other members of The Seven.”
“So, don’t repeat their scripted, empty platitudes.”
“You need to tell them a fact.”
Lynn lowered his voice, like a devil’s whisper, perfectly wrapping a trap as a crown and presenting it to Homelander.
“Just say:”
“‘As long as I hear even one person calling for help, I will not leave.'”
These words brought another silence from Homelander.
This line was far more powerful than Vought’s “Hope is with you,” and it aligned perfectly with his self-image as a savior.
Lynn didn’t stop.
He knew he had to strike while the iron was hot, fastening the shackles link by link.
“Then, look straight into the camera. Make sure every media outlet broadcasting live gets a clear shot.”
“Let them know that your rescue is not controlled by anyone.”
“You will say: ‘No one will be left off-camera.'”
This line, like a needle, pierced straight through Vought’s superficial PR logic.
He loved that feeling.
“And finally,” Lynn cast his most lethal bait, a declaration powerful enough to make Homelander completely abandon reason and embrace his raw ego.
“You must tell everyone who exactly is saving them.”
“You will say: ‘Today, it is not Vought saving you.'”
“‘It’s me.'”
Lynn uttered that final “me” with a weight that was both feather-light and incredibly heavy.
Like a key, it instantly unlocked the deepest chest of Pandora’s box within Homelander—the vault of his narcissism and divinity.
“Heh…”
Through his earpiece, Lynn heard an uncontrollable, immensely pleased chuckle from Homelander.
He had been completely won over.
These few lines perfectly satisfied all his secret desires: defying Vought, towering over his teammates, and displaying his unique, peerless divinity.
“I’ll say exactly that,” Homelander decided, his voice pulsing with arrogant excitement.
In the command center, Ashley’s countdown reached its end.
“Go!”
On the screen, Homelander’s star-spangled figure leaped from the top of The Seven Tower like a blue meteor, hurtling toward the billowing black smoke rising from the harbor district.
Minutes later, he arrived over the disaster zone.
Every lens, every drone, locked onto him in that instant.
Instead of landing directly on the west main building as scripted, he hovered in midair like a true deity, looking down at the burning ruins below.
“What… what is he doing?” Ashley gripped her walkie-talkie nervously.
“Tell him to land according to protocol! Now!”
But it was already too late.
Homelander slowly raised his hand, making a gesture for silence.
Then, facing the cameras, he offered a compassionate yet majestic smile.
Delivered through the broadcasting equipment, his voice rang clearly across the entire disaster zone, reaching hundreds of millions of viewers worldwide.
“As long as I hear even one person calling for help, I will not leave.”
The live comment feed froze for a split second, then erupted like a geyser.
[Oh my god! What did he just say?]
[Those lines are so badass! Completely different from before!]
[Now *that* is how a god should speak!]
Ashley stared at the screen, dumbfounded, feeling as if her heart was about to leap out of her throat.
“Who wrote those lines for him? That’s not our script!” she shrieked. Enjoying the story?
Yet, what broke her completely was still to come.
Homelander descended slowly.
Sweeping his gaze across the panicked rescue workers and media reporters, he delivered the second line with absolute authority.
“No one will be left off-camera.”
Finally, he looked directly into Vought International’s official live broadcast lens, his blue eyes brimming with absolute confidence and hubris.
“Today, it is not Vought saving you.”
“It’s me.”
In the command center, there was dead silence.
Ashley’s face instantly went white.
She was ruined.
He had completely gone off-script.
And in front of the entire world, he had publicly stripped Vought of the credit and claimed it all for himself.
However, the head of the public opinion monitoring team suddenly screamed, pointing at the data on the screen, his voice trembling with excitement.
“Approval rating! Oh my god! Homelander’s real-time approval rating has broken ninety percent! It’s still rising!”
“The phrase ‘It’s me’ has topped the global social media trending charts!”
The entire internet was going wild.
They assumed this was Vought International’s latest “unfiltered hero” reality marketing stunt.
They found this version of Homelander—no longer reciting dry PR scripts, but overflowing with dominance and confidence—absolutely mind-blowing.
Amid the chaos, the expressions of the Vought executives shifted from terror to confusion, and finally to a sick state of ecstasy.
Entirely by accident, they had created an even more popular god.
Only Lynn watched the screen calmly from start to finish.
He watched Homelander basking in the cheers of the crowd and the flashing cameras, enjoying unprecedented devotion.
Then, he closed his eyes.
His super-hearing activated instantly, piercing through the noise and din of the scene, zeroing in on a faint sound that was almost impossible to detect.
It was the sound of a little girl choking on thick smoke, sobbing intermittently from deep inside the East No. 3 utility tunnel—a zone already declared to have zero chance of survival.
Lynn opened his eyes and pressed the button for Homelander’s private channel.
Staring at the god on the screen who was busy savoring his victory, he spoke in a tone that was calm to the point of being chilling, offering a soft reminder.
“Listen.”
“Someone is still calling for help.”