Chapter 4: Staged

"You wanna show the fucking world that we can be hurt?" Maeve asked.

"Not just hurt." Homelander responded. "But killed even."

"Why the fuck would we do that?" Translucent voiced. Despite being invisible that fact didn't apply to his outfit. "Wouldn't it make us look weak?"

"It makes us look vulnerable." Maeve reasoned.

"And like pussy's." A-Train added.

Homelander gritted his teeth momentarily, but smiled. "Look one way or another this is gonna get out. Something crashed that wasn't a satellite, a drone or whatever fucking shit they like to make up." He spoke as he walked around the conference room.

"No sort of debris of any kind, a 911 call and cops were on the scene before our guys. Not to mention a fucking call was made from there, to Jeff Fucking Bezos."

That last part rose a few eyebrows. "You didn't know." Homelander observed, genuinely surprised as well.

"Well crime analytics informed me that a man called about a crash, but only mentioned a hole in the sky and a green thing shooting out of it. Then apparently said crash site someone called Jeff Bezos personal phone number."

"That's bullshit." A-Train says with a laugh.

Homelander then looks at the speedster with disdain. "So is a giant fucking orange chihuahua kicking all three of your asses and just disappearing like smoke." He replied, prompting A-Train to shut up.

"There's also evidence you were all at the scene along with some orange hair that is unidentifiable with anything on earth." Homelander continued. "Something's gonna get out, so we two options."

"Option number 1: Bury our heads and let some wild story shoot out that we'll need to spin." The caped hero begins to list, then pauses to let them soak in the information.

Noir then holds up two fingers to indicate what the second option was. "So glad you asked Noir. Option number 2: What I recommend, is that we control the narrative now, before any major story comes out. Do a press conference, say the basics now and then-"

"Lay on a pile of alien invasion crap that raises our points and gives the writers a new movie idea." Maeve finished.

Homelander looks unoffended and smiles. "Didn't actually think of that last part." Walks back to his seat. "Now what do you guys say?"

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With Ben:-

He was walking the streets of New York City looking for a pay phone, but there weren't any around. Also people had weird new phones called Androids and IPhones.

There was also something called Uber in addition to Taxi's. The president also changed to some dude that looked like a dude wearing a Cheeto costume with a powdered wig on.

On top of all that there's a ridiculous amount of merchandise from some company called Vought.

TV, Video Games, toys, clothes, costumes and even people. He bumped into some idiots named Ice Prince and Ice Princess, wearing stupid bright blue costumes by a mall near Times Square. And the girl was wearing so much ice like makeup she looked like a Killer Frost knockoff.

For some reason they gave him an autograph which was tossed aside less than two seconds after. He did follow in though to see what these guys were, since this Vought company was a big deal.

A few minutes later, at the overcrowded center of the mall, they started doing weird ice power tricks.

This got the 10 year old's attention. Nobody just has ice powers, they don't look like aliens, definitely not robots so what's going on They did a few tricks like make snow flakes come down and create snow cones for kids.

But then started answering questions like a celebrity couple.

After a few minutes Ben scoffed. "Sell outs." He thought out loud.

"What'd you say?" A middle aged dude, with a huskier build and an Ice Princess shirt asked. "That they're sell outs." He added with anger.

Ben then walked away, not wanting to get into a fight. All the while the man kept talking about how great they were.

The rest of the mall was pretty barren, save for a few shoppers. As Ben was passing by an electronic store called Best Buy he saw some guys with guns robbing the place.

"Looks like these guys are gonna be handful." He spoke before going somewhere to get out sight and dial an alien. "Four handfuls to be precise." He added before selecting Fourarms however he instead got.

"Heatblast?" Looks himself over. "I shouldn't be surprised at this point."

Goes into the store and calls out. "Freeze dirtbags!" All eyes turn on him and subsequently all the guns. Before they can be fired Heatblast fired small streams of fire to heat the guns just enough to drop them.

"Careful those seem hot." He quipped.

"Now against the wall!" The fire alien ordered the criminals to do and they complied. "That was easy." Ben smiled then frowned.

"Too easy." Goes to the discarded rifles and picks one up, he then takes out the clip and see's it was empty. Same goes for another two and the last one was full of rubber bullets and only half full.

"Turn around!" Heatblast orders and they again comply. "What's going on? I know this isn't a real robbery, believe me I've seen plenty."

No response.

"Ok then." Heatblast says, then goes to a nervous looking robber at the end. "You better start talking or else."

"Or else what?" He replied, maintaining a tough facade.

Ben holds up his palm and creates a ball of fire. "Or else I'll start deciding if I want you medium or well done." He threatens, making the man gulp.

"Here's what I think." Heatblast starts. "I think you guys were paid to rob this place too make some other guys look good. My guess it's the frosty's doing there little Q , unless you guys are that stupid to rob a store when guys like that are in walking distance." He finished.

The man blinks and is visibly sweating, but not just because of the heat. "I'm getting warm aren't I." He quipped, knowing he was right.