The Boys: I Became The Soldier Boy

Chapter 69: Chapter 69: Becca is Still Alive...

Chapter 69: Becca is Still Alive...

"But what if I told you..." Adana said slowly, watching Mallory’s retreating back, "...that Vought International is actually still running human trials of Compound V on people all over the world? That they’re still manufacturing a never-ending supply of Supe-Terrorists?" fгeewebnovёl.com

Mallory stopped in her tracks. Kimiko’s expression shifted instantly as she spun her head around to glare dead at him. For Kimiko, her entire hatred was directed at Vought—she loathed Vought for turning her and her brother into monsters. To this day, she still hadn’t found her brother... and there was a very real chance her brother might be wiped out by Vought’s superheroes under the guise of being a Supe-Terrorist.

"What do you mean?" Mallory’s brow furrowed slightly. "Just a few days ago, Soldier Boy openly confessed to Vought’s past crimes at a press conference, promising that all Compound V experimentation had been completely halted and that the remaining vials had been rounded up and destroyed. My intelligence sources do not lie."

"Come now, everyone." Adana acted as though he had just heard the most ridiculous joke, spreading his arms wide in an exaggerated fashion. "You people actually believe the absolute horseshit coming from two villains who are lower than dogs?!"

Butcher and Mother’s Milk exchanged a look. Deep-seated doubt and fury flared in the depths of their eyes. It was true; they had never believed a single word of Vought’s public relations scrubbing.

Adana smiled with total confidence. He snapped his fingers, and a bodyguard behind him immediately handed over a black, waterproof tablet. He tossed the tablet onto a pew. "Not to mention, I have the intelligence and leads in my hands. When it comes to gathering info, there’s no way the Church of the Collective falls short of you."

The screen lit up. It clearly displayed several highly classified night-vision surveillance videos. In the footage, over the rolling waters of the high seas, several unmarked fishing boats were conducting a trade. Crates upon crates of goods were being hauled out and transferred onto another vessel; the people on the receiving end cracked one open to inspect it, revealing vials of a blue liquid—Compound V!

"Those goddamn animals, I fucking knew it!" Mother’s Milk’s voice shook with raw, hateful fury. "Compound V... that goddamn poison ruined my family! Soldier Boy... when that bastard was putting on a publicity stunt on the streets back in the day, he hurled a car just to catch a common mugger, crushing my family alive! Exactly—how could a piece of shit like him ever become a real superhero?! This entire thing is nothing but a self-directed, self-acted puppet show by that father and son!"

Mother’s Milk grew increasingly furious as he spoke. He wanted nothing more than to storm Vought Tower right this second and rip Soldier Boy to shreds. Having harbored an inherent hatred for Soldier Boy, there was naturally no way he would believe the bastard would choose to play the hero, nor did he buy into any of that corporate PR spin.

Beside him, Butcher patted Mother’s Milk’s shoulder, calming his brother’s volatile emotions. He countered with a question: "Videos can be faked. How do I know you didn’t just cook this garbage up to play us, holy roller?"

"Because of logic, Mr. Butcher. You know that better than anyone else." Adana stepped up to Butcher, locking eyes with him as he murmured, "Mother’s Milk’s family was slaughtered by Soldier Boy. And you, Mr. Butcher... your beloved wife, Becca, was raped by that animal Homelander."

"Let me ask you: would a pair of human garbage with blood on their hands suddenly find a conscience, clean up their act, and become legitimate superheroes saving the world? Don’t make me laugh..."

"You’re a fucking scumbag yourself," Mallory said, glaring coldly at him. "So what the hell are you playing at?" Mallory cut Adana off.

"I’m just a pathetic church man trying to safeguard his life’s work," Adana adjusted his tie, continuing smoothly. "Instead of letting that lawless father-and-son duo rule the world, wouldn’t it be better for the Church of the Collective to take their place? Our impact on society would be far more gentle, wouldn’t it?"

"What do you need us to do?" Butcher’s gaze turned lethally dangerous. If it meant killing Homelander, he was more than willing to make a deal.

"Simple," Adana smiled. "I will leverage all remaining intelligence networks and resources within the Church to fully back you. And your little team—The Boys—will take my intel and do whatever it takes, by any means necessary, to pull down Vought. Of course, if you have a need for it, I can even provide you with a few vials of Compound V..."

Mallory sank into deep thought.

---<>---

A few minutes later, Mallory led The Boys straight out of the abandoned church without a single backward glance, vanishing into the night. The hollow church descended once more into a dead silence. The warm facade on Alastair’s face vanished, replaced by a triumphant smirk. He turned around, pacing toward the fractured crucifix.

During this recent stretch, his circumstances had indeed been utterly dire. But fortunately, right before his death, Vought’s former CEO Stan Edgar had left behind a mountain of intelligence, data, and contingencies. According to that intel, Adana knew perfectly well that Vought would soon initiate a total purge of the Church. And because of the failsafes Edgar provided, Alastair had managed to secure a significant amount of leverage. Under the circumstances, why not strike first? He would be liquidated by Vought sooner or later anyway...

Furthermore, according to Edgar, Soldier Boy actually seemed to want to be a legitimate superhero... which was the most absurd, hilarious joke of all, yet Adana had no choice but to believe it.

Alastair muttered to himself, "Soldier Boy... he said you might actually want to be a real superhero. But we can’t have that, can we? That would get right in the way of my Church’s expansion, wouldn’t it?"

---<>---

The black cargo van rolled down the highway, an oppressive, suffocating weight hanging thick in the cabin.

"Colonel..." Frenchie asked from the back row, unable to hold back his doubt. "Are we truly going to partner with a piece of garbage like that?"

"We don’t have a choice, Frenchie," Mallory replied from the passenger seat, her voice freezing cold and resolute. "In a swamp like this, we don’t have the luxury of holding out for clean allies."

"If Alastair’s intelligence is authentic—if Vought is genuinely still running experiments and manufacturing Supe-Terrorists behind closed doors—then we must stop them at all costs. The holy roller was right about one thing: letting a greedy cult scrape by on life support is a hell of a lot better than letting a pack of superheroes assume absolute control over the world."

Meanwhile, in the driver’s seat, William Butcher looked utterly indifferent, his mind lost in unreadable thoughts.

"Listen to me, Butcher," Mallory said, turning her head toward him. "I just intercepted a piece of intel. A rogue Supe has surfaced in Newark, New Jersey."

Mallory laced her tone with heavy emphasis as she continued, "If you can lead the team to bring him in alive, and we couple him with the smuggling evidence provided by the Church of the Collective... we can drag this rogue Supe straight to the upcoming congressional hearing and throw him in the face of the global media as living, breathing proof that Vought is still running human experimentation, understand? Not to mention, we hold a substantial amount of dirt on other superheroes. If all this leaks in tandem during the hearing, it will crush Vought completely."

Butcher remained unmoved, staring straight ahead as he kept driving the van.

"If we pull this off, I’ll give you Becca’s address."

Screeech!

Accompanied by the violent, piercing screech of shredding rubber, the speeding cargo van braked hard on the pitch-black highway. The occupants inside were violently thrown forward by the massive surge of inertia.

"What did you say?!" Butcher growled, glaring dead at Mallory.

"Becca is alive. Handle this job, and I’ll hand over her coordinates so you two can reunite."

---<>---

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