Marcus leaned back into the plush leather of his sofa, a sense of serene patience settling over him. He had planted the seeds of chaos, and now he simply needed to wait for the harvest. Homelander, broken and remade, was now the king of Vought. A humiliated king. A king who had been shown his own powerlessness. The logical, inevitable next step was a desperate scramble for more power.
He knew that at this very moment, Homelander would be thinking of countermeasures, of a way to fight back against the cosmic force that had so casually put him in his place. That path led to only one destination: an evolution of Compound V. To achieve that, Homelander would have to consolidate Vought's most precious and scattered resource—the full, unabridged formula and every researcher who held a piece of it. He would gather them all in one place for Marcus. It was perfect.
A flicker of genuine excitement stirred within him. "Compound V is a crude, lucky accident," he mused to the empty room. "But it is a key. A key to unlocking latent human potential. Fused with the elegant, precise genetic science of Krypton... the possibilities are limitless. I could craft armies. I could craft gods." His quest for Vought's secret was no longer just about acquisition; it was about synthesis, about creating something the universe had never seen before.
"Right, so the head snake is gone, and now the most psychotic viper in the pit is wearin' the crown." Billy Butcher paced the cramped confines of their van, a storm cloud of frustration. "Brilliant. Just bloody brilliant. This isn't gonna be harder, it's gonna be a bloody shitshow. He'll have no one to tell him no."
"Guys, uh... you need to see this," Hughie interrupted, his face pale in the glow of his laptop. He turned the screen around. "It's not just us poking the bear anymore."
The video was grainy, shot on a cheap camera. A figure in a black mask and tactical gear stood before a cinderblock wall, their voice distorted into a low, menacing rasp. Surrounding them were other figures, their powers on raw display. One's eyes glowed with a sickly green light; another's skin was covered in shifting, chitinous plates. These weren't the polished, camera-ready supes of Vought. These were something else.
"...and so we declare war," the distorted voice announced. "War on Vought, war on their pet 'heroes,' and war on the system that allows them to exist. We are the true evolution. We are the Liberation Front."
Butcher let out a short, cynical laugh. "Well, I'll be. Look at that. A new pack of nutters. Good. Let 'em draw fire. While Vought's busy with the new boogeyman, we can slip in the back door."
"More supes killing people is not 'good,' Billy," MM cautioned, his expression grim. "This is just going to raise the body count."
"Maybe," Butcher conceded, "but it's also a god-sent distraction."
In the Vought boardroom, the atmosphere was tense. Homelander sat in Stan Edgar's chair, his feet propped contemptuously on the polished mahogany desk. A nervous man named Miller and now Homelander's puppet, nervously gestured to the large screen displaying the same propaganda video.
"We've cross-referenced their faces and known energy signatures with every subject in our database, going back to the forties," Miller stammered. "Nothing. It's like they appeared out of thin air. We control the global supply of Compound V. This shouldn't be possible."
"We have thousands of assets, Homelander," another executive chimed in, trying to sound helpful. "But most are... imperfect. You know this. The man who sweats acid, the woman who teleports but arrives nauseous and disoriented. For every Starlight, there are a hundred duds who can't be put in the field. This 'Liberation Front'... their powers seem stable. Functional. It's a genuine mystery."
The assembled supes—what was left of the old and new Seven—shifted uncomfortably. They had just survived a god of magnetism. They were not eager for another fight. But their arrogance, a necessary balm for their recent humiliation, quickly took over.
"Some back-alley freaks with powers?" sneered Shockwave. "We just fought a being that rained a city down on our heads. This is a vacation." He conveniently ignored the fact that he had been one of the first to be incapacitated. Still, a silent, collective prayer went through the room: Please don't let the Tenno show up again.
Homelander listened, a predatory stillness about him. This was perfect. A public, decisive victory against a new, terrifying threat would be the ideal way to cement his new leadership and wash away the stain of his defeat.
"They want to challenge Vought?" he said, his voice dangerously low, his eyes beginning to glow. "They're challenging me. Go." He pointed a finger at the assembled supes. "Remind the world who runs it."
"You have your orders," Miller squeaked, playing his part as the corporate mouthpiece. "The Seven and its associated assets will engage and neutralize the threat posed by the Liberation Front. This is a top-priority mission to defend the integrity and reputation of Vought International."
The supes filed out, not because Miller ordered it, but because the man whose feet were on Miller's desk willed it. The mission wasn't just about reputation; it was about control. The Tenno attack had sent Vought's stock into a nosedive. They needed a public win, fast, to prove that the company was stable under its new, supe-led management.
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