"So, Vought's a superhero support company for the world, but secretly they're just mass-producing this drug called Compound V, huh? Yeah, typical corporate bullshit," Satoru said, nodding his head after hearing what Makima had to say, which she learned from reading that doctor's mind.
They were walking through the corridor, the same one painted red from Satoru's earlier carnage. Makima was ahead of him, and he followed, his hands resting behind his head.
Without turning around, Makima said, "I assume we're in the same circumstance?"
"If by circumstance you mean not being from this world, then yes. But it also seems we've met before, at least, fought together."
She replied, "Hmm… that too… Why don't we search this entire place first?"
"Not a bad idea. I'm tired of these gowns anyway. Might find something better to wear." 'This unwanted ventilation on my balls is frustrating,' he thought with a frown.
As they walked, they suddenly came across the scientists Satoru had left in the room where he woke up. It seemed they were running away.
Makima just pointed her hand at them, and in a blink, all but one were pinned to either the floor or the wall with different melee weapons. It looked like the front of Dracula's castle.
Satoru was unbothered; he just looked at Makima, who was now reading the mind of the one remaining woman.
After a while, the chain attached to the woman's head disappeared, and her head exploded, blood splattering all over Makima's face and body.
A little smirk hung on her face as she turned around, her golden eyes gleaming under the dim light of the corridor. She looked at Satoru, trying to see if he'd change his expression.
However, other than those glistening blue eyes trying to discern her, she couldn't sense anything else. 'What a strange man,' Makima thought to herself.
Satoru came close and stood beside her, then asked, "So? Find anything new?"
She nodded and replied, "I know about a room where we might get some supplies and more info about the outside world."
Satoru suddenly patted her shoulder; due to their height difference, he looked down at her with a big smile on his face, saying, "Cool. You're pretty good at this. Come on, let's go."
Simply intrigued by his demeanor, she walked ahead of him, and he followed. After a while of taking elevators and walking through the same dull white rooms, they both finally got to their destination.
"Hmm, it seems everyone else has been eliminated," Makima said as they both noticed that, at that moment, no one was alive anymore.
'True, I could sense several individuals before,' he thought, shrugging.
They were now inside a supply center, and they quickly began to forage around. Finally, after several minutes, they found something worth putting on.
Satoru was about to change when he saw Makima looking at him. He quickly covered his crotch and chest, saying, "Oh, don't ogle me, you pervert." He gave a wink with a teasing smile, but Makima just gave a deadpan look, turned around, and started changing.
"Tsk, killjoy," Satoru muttered, bummed that she gave no reaction, and turned around to start changing his clothes.
Satoru was now wearing dark-blue pants with a tight black t-shirt and a blue jacket over it; he'd also found a pair of dark-leather shoes. The fit was a bit tight, but they'd do for now.
Makima had found a formal white shirt and black pants, with a long coat over it. She was also wearing a black tie, her hair tied back in a low ponytail, a single tuft of her auburn hair framing her forehead.
"Someone looks late for the office," Satoru remarked and got no reaction whatsoever. They then went to another room nearby; it was a data storage center.
Several documents were safely kept in drawers and lockers, and a few computers were lined up on a table on one side of the room.
"You look through the computers; I'll go through the documents," Satoru said, and she nodded. After a few minutes, Makima was still browsing the files on the computer when Satoru suddenly stood beside her and leaned on the table.
"You're done?" Makima asked.
"Yup. Useless records dating back to 1955 about the application of this Compound V and how it's improved through the years- pretty much useless for us," he replied.
"You read through all of them?" she asked, looking back at the hundreds, if not thousands, of documents now scattered.
"I have pretty good eyes," Satoru said, pointing at his eyes with a thumb. "You find anything?"
"Only this, maybe…" She shrugged and played a video clip. It was a bodycam recording, likely from one of the scientists or guards.
It showed a large underground space, and as they walked, they came across a gigantic ravine filled to the brim with monster corpses- tens, if not hundreds of thousands- all dead, with two individuals lying unconscious on top of the heap.
"That explains why they were afraid of us," Satoru muttered. Although this clarified some things, it still didn't answer how they got there in the first place.
Satoru then looked at Makima, who was holding a flash drive she found in one of the drawers. Seeing him tilt his head, she said, "There are some electronic records of those files here; might need them in the future."
Satoru gave a smirk. Vought's whole superhero operation was just a big public propaganda stunt, and with info like this, blackmailing a giga-corporation seemed like a fun idea.
'Yeah, why not,' he thought, his smile growing wider. "Hell yeah, I'm in."
Ignoring the overly excited fool, Makima continued transferring important files and records.
Suddenly, the whole place started glowing red, and alarms blared, "Warning, facility self-destruction in five minutes."
"Tsk, I would've finished in just a few more minutes," Makima muttered.
Satoru patted her shoulder, saying, "Relax, you still have five minutes. Just do your thing. I know it's a bit strange to ask but trust me on this one."
Makima would have thought he was out of his mind, but there was indeed something special about him. She wouldn't have cared if she still had her pseudo-immortality contract, but…
She gave a sigh and decided to see if this guy was really worth all that risk or if he was just full of shit. She continued what she was doing.
Outside the facility, above ground in the middle of a forest clearing, there was a small cabin opening that led to the underground facility.
Surrounding the entrance from quite a distance were several armored trucks, tanks, and hundreds of fully geared soldiers.
Inside one of the big trucks, the leader of the soldiers was holding a tablet, looking at the security cam feed. 'Strange, they're just sitting there casually, even though the self-destruction countdown has already activated,' he thought.
"They probably think it's a bluff or something," one of the armed men standing beside the leader spoke.
The leader shrugged, "Their funeral, then." He said this, placing the tablet on the table. Now they just had to wait until the facility was destroyed and, for safe measure, check if they survived.
They'd seen what both could do in close combat, so that was the best option their superior had devised. What he couldn't understand was why they wouldn't send Homelander or someone strong to deal with this.
'Tsk, not my problem. I'll just follow the orders,' he thought to himself and waited for the countdown to reach zero.
Inside the facility: "Self-destruction in 15 seconds."
"Is it done?" Satoru asked.
"A few more seconds," she replied.
Satoru suddenly put his hand on her shoulder; she was surprised, feeling that shimmering barrier surrounding her too.
'This was his plan, huh,' she thought.
"Self-destruction in 5… 4… 3… 2… 1."
Outside, the forest suddenly started shaking as if it were an earthquake. The cabin that led to the opening collapsed, and the surrounding area, nearly a 300-meter radius, started caving in as smoke began rising from the cracks in the ground.
Then, after a few seconds of silence, the entire area that was caving in was engulfed in a column of bright orange fire that came from the depths of the facility and soared to the sky, burning bright and hot, vaporizing and sending everything into the atmosphere.
Like an erupted volcano, ash and smoke started falling back onto the forest. The leader of the backup team, sitting inside the truck, gritted his teeth. 'Those fuckers, they didn't say anything about a damn furnace that would melt everything,' he thought.
Just to be safe, he'd ordered everyone to stay at least 500 meters away from the cabin. 'If we were any closer…' He clicked his tongue in frustration. 'Were they planning to eliminate us too?' he thought to himself.
Now, there was no need to even check if they were still alive. However, that thought soon halted when one of his men called through the comms from outside, "Sir! Sir!"
"What?"
"You need to see this."
He sighed and walked outside the truck. The soldier was standing outside, looking into the sky. The earlier destruction had cleared the sky, so he too could clearly see what was there.
The two they had been assigned to eliminate were completely fine. The guy was holding the woman like a bride, floating above the giant hole that had just been created.
"I want every weapon pointed at them… Shoot the fuckers down. Fire!" the leader ordered. Right after, the tanks realigned their cannons and machine guns at the two in the sky.
Several heavy weapons mounted atop the trucks aimed at them, and almost everyone at once started firing at them.
The forest was engulfed in the deafening booms of the cannons and constant shots of high-caliber rounds.
"See that, Makima-chan? We're famous already," Satoru said to the woman, who was definitely surprised that they survived that blaze, but also at the fact that he just called her chan.
"Hold on to me for a second," he said, and she silently wrapped her arm behind his neck, freeing his left hand.
"Wanna see something cool?" he asked, and she tilted her head.
'Selecting a wide range of targets individually… Let's see if I can pull this off,' he thought and pointed his free hand at the attackers, who were still firing at them.
'Limitless amplification…' Satoru thought with a grin. The firing abruptly stopped, and everyone on the forest floor surrounding the big hole suddenly felt as if gravity had stopped working.
Makima looked down, only to see all tanks and trucks, including the soldiers on the ground, floating in the air, slowly gaining altitude, everything enveloped in shimmering blue energy.
Satoru raised his finger, sending them higher and higher, then suddenly brought them all down, accelerating them toward the ground at an insane speed.
The people splattered on the forest floor, and the vehicles, all crushed under their own weight, exploded with fuel and ammunition, engulfing the whole place and slowly burning everything down.
'Not quite the outcome I was hoping for, but still progress nonetheless,' he thought, looking at his hand. Makima was sure now that she was lucky he didn't decide to kill her. It would be best to play safe until she got a similar contract like she had in her world.
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A while ago, right after Satoru had woken up-
New York: Vought Tower.
Stan Edgar, the CEO of Vought, was in his office, going through some documents, writing something on a note, when someone pushed open the office door.
He raised his head, only to see Madelyn in distress. "Sitwell, I hope you have a good reason for almost breaking my door," he said.
"Sir, it's about our facility in Brazil," she said, frantic, and immediately handed him the tablet she was holding.
Without much change in his expression, Stan watched the different cam feeds on the tablet, showing what was happening in the secret base.
The white-haired man, whom they'd retrieved from that heap of monster corpses, was wreaking havoc inside the facility.
His powers, speed, and strength as he dispatched Vought's fully geared guards, and how he bored a hole through the entirety of the base to the disposal pit.
Then there was the woman, who also seemed to have strange abilities. There was no audio feed, so he couldn't know what they were saying, but it seemed they were working together.
"Where's Homelander?" he asked the nervous woman standing in front of his desk.
"H-He's out searching for Translucent. E-Even his phone's off. He left a note saying he'll be back after he finds him," she replied.
He looked at her with a neutral face. "Your one job is to keep him in line, and you fail to accomplish even that."
On the live feed, seeing the two rummaging through everything in the data storage where most of the documents were located, Stan made a choice. 'Sending in more soldiers would just be in vain,' he thought.
He brought out a comms device from inside his drawer and connected to Vought's task force leader who was on-site.
"Eliminate them all, initiate protocol E.N.D," he spoke on the comms.
"Roger," the leader replied from the other side, connecting his own cam feed to the tablet Stan was holding.
"Sir, it's on. Self-destruction in five minutes," came the leader's reply. After that, they just waited, his fingers impatiently tapping on the table, while his expression remained unchanged.
Stan was more surprised that both of them were still just sitting in front of that computer, not at all worried about the self-destruction.
After the time passed and the facility was vaporized in flames, Stan's focus shifted to the feed from the task force's leader.
Just a few seconds later, the leader walked outside, and as he looked up, he adjusted the camera to a higher angle. There, in the sky, in the middle of the big hole, he saw the two levitating, completely fine.
He kept watching until the firing that came after suddenly stopped. The white-haired man, as he held the woman, his hand glowing with blue shimmering energy; the camera suddenly started elevating. As the angle changed, there was a second's glimpse of everything around the leader- everything floating in the sky- and then...
Stan just blinked and took a few relaxed breaths, then took a shot of the drink that was on his table. He opened the recording of that live feed and paused it on the last second.
All vehicles, people- everything lifted in the air, the same blue energy enveloping them, and then getting smashed to the ground.
Stan suddenly stood up from his chair. Madelyn, getting more stressed, spoke, "Sir—"
"Home-" Stan's voice almost broke. He immediately collected his emotions and spoke, "Bring Homelander here as soon as possible."
"Sir, I-"
Before she could finish speaking, Stan interjected, "You may leave now; you have a task at hand."
Madelyn reluctantly got out of the room, and Stan walked to the side of the room and poured another glass of whisky.
He finished it in one sip and thought, 'They were both perfectly fine. That means whatever they gathered from that data center is still with them.'
Stan had already realized the potential danger of these two individuals. In fact, the moment Vought had found them at first, he had a bad feeling about this.
The sheer number of dead monsters they'd found in that ravine in Argentina- if those monsters had been able to get out of that chasm, half of South America would have been gone before the superheroes could take any action.
But those two had killed those monsters themselves. As far as Stan knew, there was no Supe alive who could perform at such levels.
Homelander, maybe, if he'd just get his head right. But he knew that was asking too much. 'I'm losing my cool… I need to think this through, need to think of a plan,' he thought to himself.
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Back in Brazil- After a few hours:
Satoru and Makima were walking through the forest. Makima was in front, as they moved through the dense woods; she was explaining a few more things she'd read from those people's minds and Satoru was aligning them with what he'd read from those documents.
"Hmm… Everything's pretty much the same until World War II, then," Satoru said, pushing a bush to the side.
"Ours was quite different, though," Makima spoke, and after a moment of silence, she continued, "Devils, for as long as humans have existed, have been a major influence in our history."
"Well, you're one too, so I guess you'd know much more," Satoru said.
Makima stopped in her tracks, turned around, and said, "And how can you say that I'm a devil?"
"Well, for starters, let's talk about how you're literally made up of negative energy. The devils from your world, as you explained, sound a lot like the cursed spirits from my world, at least in how they originate. And you, you're so much like the cursed spirits I'm used to being around." He got closer to her and brought his face down to hers, just an inch short of their lips touching.
Makima felt slightly uncomfortable under the gaze of those azure eyes, but she didn't flinch; she had the same smirk as Satoru. The more she knew this man, the more interesting he was getting.
Satoru added, "But this does seem like your true form, though." 'A devil, entirely existing as a human…' And Satoru, too, was getting interested in knowing what her deal really was.
Satoru's demeanor suddenly changed as he pulled back, with a big smile on his face. He immediately changed the subject, "But to think we've already established the existence of three different dimensions. The multiverse theorists from my world would go crazy if they even knew about this."
It was strange to think that he'd died back in Shinjuku and now he was here, in this completely new world. And a devil from another world, as his "partner"? 'Dunno, there's a chance we might end up at each other's throats,' he thought, shrugging; he always went with the flow anyway.
Makima just looked at the guy who was humming some tune as he walked without a care in the world. She shook her head with a subtle smile on her face and caught up to him.
"By the way, what did you even save from that computer?" Satoru asked.
"Some important records of this Compound V, dating back to World War II. Some details about the one who made this drug, Frederick Vought. I didn't have enough time to look at it," she replied.
"Well, this might put the whole corporation on our backs or make us billionaires," he said with a smirk.
"Us?" she tilted her head.
"Yeah. We're a team, right?" he asked with that same smirk on his face.
She didn't respond, just quickened her pace and walked ahead of him. "Hey, I know you won't admit it, but we are a team," he said, following her and trying to catch up.
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To be continued!