"Greevs…" Edgar stared at him for a moment, then said coldly, "Sit wherever you like. Ashley's already given you the details."
Once Ivan sat down, Edgar continued.
"This thing is spreading faster than we imagined. Vought is under pressure like you wouldn't believe. The public, the NYPD, even the Office of Superhuman Affairs all want an answer yesterday. If we don't get a handle on it, Vought and every supe on the roster take a beating we won't recover from. I don't need to tell you twice how bad this is.
And given how things stand, there's no chance of burying the story from the outside."
"Mr. Edgar, I heard Homelander never left Vought Tower when it happened. Plenty of employees can back that up. Doesn't that mean someone impersonated him, killed Stormfront, and framed Homelander?" the head of PR said.
Ivan shook his head. "The public won't buy it. They'll just say Vought is covering it up, trying to wash Homelander clean."
Nobody was going to believe Vought's excuses or their so-called evidence. Not now.
"We still can't just let the story run," the PR head said, voice low. "At least another face showing up would split their attention."
"Mr. Edgar, you need to see this."
Ashley walked back into the conference room with her phone, hurried over to Edgar, and spoke in a rush.
Edgar's face went darker the second he saw the photo on the screen. "Put it on the display."
"Yes, sir."
Every eye in the room locked onto the image that filled the wall.
"That's…" The PR head almost threw up on the spot. His face went white. The photo hit him like a truck.
The other department heads looked just as wrecked.
Men who spent their days in penthouses and boardrooms had never seen anything that bloody.
Ivan and Edgar were the only two who didn't flinch. That made them the odd ones out.
"Who posted this?" Edgar asked.
"Unknown account, no registration. And the photos weren't taken down. That's strange." Ashley opened the poster's profile.
"The wounds are all laser cuts. Burn marks left behind. Right now the only one who can do that is…"
Ivan didn't say the name.
Everyone in the room already knew.
Even Ashley started wondering if her own memory was wrong. Homelander never left the Tower. How the hell did Stormfront end up with heat-vision burns?
Meanwhile Butcher and the others were watching the same news on TV.
"Holy shit! Homelander actually killed Stormfront." Frenchie grinned like he'd just been handed a present.
Butcher stared at Homelander on the screen and didn't look away. The whole thing was too crazy. Too crazy to make sense.
"Something's off. Homelander's a piece of shit, but he's not stupid. He wouldn't ice Stormfront in public, and he sure as hell wouldn't leave the body for anyone to find. Someone wanted this found."
"You're saying someone dressed up as Homelander and killed her?" Hughie frowned.
Kimiko smiled and signed a few words at Frenchie.
"Kimiko says whoever killed Stormfront is her friend."
"Kimiko's got a point," Hughie said, nodding hard.
Butcher let out a long breath. "This has someone's fingerprints all over it."
"You mean the mystery guy?" Hughie already knew who he meant.
"This bastard's got more than one power. Or he can copy other people's. Those burns on the body look like heat vision, sure. I still don't buy Homelander did it."
"What the hell does he want?" Butcher muttered.
"Who cares."
Hughie was still smiling about Stormfront being dead.
"Don't forget our first job is finding Soldier Boy." A while back they had already tracked down the rest of Payback. Soldier Boy's old girlfriend Crimson Countess and her sidekick Gunpowder. Those two spilled plenty. Soldier Boy didn't die that day. Russian special forces dragged him off.
At the same time the conference room had gone dead quiet.
Those photos smashed every idea they had been clinging to. With pictures like that Homelander was wearing the blame whether he liked it or not. They could drag out every camera log in the Tower proving he never left the building and it would not matter. Nobody would believe a word. They could not even split the public's attention anymore.
"There is still a way to wash Homelander clean," Ivan said suddenly.
Mallory's photos were a hammer, yes. That did not mean they were finished.
"Talk."
Right then Homelander pushed the door open and walked in. He looked around the table, then his eyes settled on Ivan.
Ivan had felt him listening outside the whole time. Radio waves do not lie.
"I want everyone to look at this." Ivan took out the phone he had already prepared and set it on the table.
"What is that?"
The PR head picked it up out of curiosity. The second he saw the pictures his mouth fell open and his pupils shook.
"Let me see." The other heads passed the phone around one by one. Every face went slack with shock.
"How do you have this?"
The PR head's voice was shaking.
"A few days ago Maeve came to me. She found these in Stormfront's bag by accident. At first she wanted to bury them. Then she thought it over and brought them to me. She wanted my opinion." Ivan smiled.
"I planned to hand them over when the timing felt right. Never got the chance, so I sat on them. Now is as good a time as any. They happen to help Homelander."
"How convenient."
Edgar looked at the photos of Stormfront posing with Nazi officers and smiled without using his eyes.
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Read 12 Advance Chapters—P@t- Captain69