Transmigrated into The Boys, Starting as Soldier Boy

Chapter 37: Chapter 37: Edgar’s Last Resort

Stan Edgar sat in his private conference room, a brief message flashing on the tablet screen in front of him.

Soldier Boy has left Vought Tower and gone out alone.

He read the message three times.

Then he set the tablet down and picked up the encrypted phone on the desk, the one that was never connected to any network.

"He’s on his way."

Edgar’s voice was steady and calm.

"This is our last chance. If he comes back alive this time, all of you, me, and Vought are finished. There won’t be a second chance, and there is no backup plan. Today, he dies in Pennsylvania."

There was a long silence on the other end of the line. Then a woman’s hoarse voice sounded.

"Do you know what it cost us last time just to get rid of him?"

"This time, you don’t need to get rid of him. If you can kill him outright..."

"He can’t be killed. We couldn’t kill him. The Soviet Union couldn’t kill him either."

"Novichok is ready."

Edgar said it plainly.

"The nerve agent the Russians developed back then, specifically for Soldier Boy. One dose is all it takes to knock him out. I’ve already had the agent delivered to you."

Another silence followed. Then the woman asked:

"Who’s coming?"

"Besides you, the TNT Twins, Tommy and Tessa, and Mindstorm."

Edgar listed the names one by one, as if counting rotten debts from an overdue ledger.

"And a few Supes I hired separately, some domestic, some overseas. They’re strong. You don’t know them, and you don’t need to know them. They’re my people. They’re paid to do a job and won’t ask questions. All you need to do is one thing: cooperate. If you could send him into a Russian cage back then, you can send him back into one today."

The call ended.

Edgar placed the encrypted phone on the table and picked up the glass of whiskey beside him.

The ice had already melted, diluting the amber liquor into a cloudy pale yellow. He glanced at it, then set it down without taking a sip.

Edgar was nervous, though he still looked calm on the surface.

But from the day Benjamin stepped into Vought Tower, he had been preparing for this moment.

He had contacted every member of Payback in advance.

He had secured the Novichok supply chain long ago.

The other Supes either owed him a favor or a debt, or they were simply his own people. Some were even as powerful as Maeve.

He had been holding these people in his hand like a deck of moldy playing cards, waiting for the day he would finally turn them over.

Today was the last card.

If it failed, the game was over.

...

...

In a remote suburb of Pennsylvania, Crimson Countess’s residence was hidden inside an abandoned resort surrounded by maple trees.

She had once been Vought’s hottest female superhero, with her own ruby-studded Supersuit and a weekly interview in People magazine.

Now she made a living selling goods on livestreams, hawking expired cosmetics and old autographed photos of herself. Nineteen ninety-nine a set, free shipping if you bought three.

She even took some shady private one-on-one livestream jobs on the side.

When Benjamin pushed the door open, the place was empty.

The coffee on the table was still steaming, and half an unextinguished cigarette rested in the ashtray.

A single slipper stuck out from under the bed, left behind in a hurry.

He glanced down at the coffee cup and touched the side with the back of his hand. Still hot.

She had just left. Or rather... just run.

"Ran fast, fuck."

He muttered under his breath.

If he had Super Speed Lv5, he might have caught up.

Then he heard footsteps outside.

A lot of footsteps, closing in from different directions through the maple grove, crushing fallen leaves in a dense, brittle rustle.

Someone snapped a dead branch. Someone whispered under their breath. frёewebnoѵel.ƈo๓

Someone was adjusting the safety on a gun.

Benjamin’s expression did not change. He took out his phone and opened an app.

Then he turned and walked out of the room, removing the shield from his left arm and holding it in front of his chest. His phone was hidden in his Supersuit, the camera aimed right outside.

At the edge of the maple grove, people were stepping out from the shadows.

Payback, along with faces he had never seen before.

Crimson Countess stood at the very front. Forty years had passed, and she had aged a lot. Her blond wig could not hide the wrinkles at the corners of her eyes, and the curve of her lips, the one he had once praised as beautiful, now held only bitterness.

She wore a cheap red dress, its color matching her codename, though several sequins had already fallen from the hem.

When Crimson Countess saw Benjamin step out of the trailer, her pupils still shrank involuntarily.

To Crimson Countess’s right stood a brother and sister.

They were holding hands, a tiny flicker of electric light glowing in their palms like a crushed star still struggling to stay alive.

Tommy and Tessa, the TNT Twins.

Without holding hands, they were just two perfectly ordinary middle-aged people, unable to blow up even a cockroach.

Behind them stood a balding man in a faded plaid shirt, both hands in his pockets. Mindstorm.

He looked the least remarkable of everyone there, but he had been the key to bringing Benjamin down back then.

His greatest ability was not combat. It was slipping into your head and digging out the thing you feared most.

Back then, he had used his Psychic Power to briefly suppress Soldier Boy’s consciousness, giving the others a chance to move.

Of course, he might still be able to control Benjamin now, but not for more than a few seconds. At this point, even half a second would be impressive.

As for Gunpowder, he had not come.

Besides them, there were at least a dozen people Benjamin had never seen before.

Some wore combat suits, some wore ordinary clothes, and some had obvious Supe traits. One woman’s hands reflected a metallic sheen in the afternoon sunlight, a little like Starlight. A short man twirled a ball of constantly shifting liquid energy around his fingertips.

Supes hired by Edgar. Benjamin did not know them, and he had no intention of getting to know them.

Dead people did not need introductions.

"Benjamin."

Crimson Countess spoke, her voice hoarser than he had imagined.

"You shouldn’t have come back alive."

"I didn’t plan on coming back alive either."

Benjamin held the shield across his chest, his voice flat.

"Before I blew those Russian bastards sky-high, I never thought I’d walk out of that lab alive. But I did. And then I remembered all of you. You things... that betrayed me. I’m going to blow every last one of you to hell."

His gaze swept over every face at the edge of the maple grove.

Crimson Countess, his ex-girlfriend, stood across from him, her fingers trembling slightly at her sides.

The TNT Twins, electric light still flickering in their palms.

Mindstorm, hands still in his pockets, his eyes studying him.

The ones still alive were enough for him to kill today.

Then footsteps sounded behind him again.

Not from the maple grove, but from the abandoned main road of the resort.

Benjamin glanced sideways. Another dozen or so people were filing out from behind the broken walls of the abandoned hotel.

"These pieces of trash are Vought’s too, right? Edgar sent them to deal with me?"

Benjamin held the shield across his chest. His voice was not loud, but every word landed firmly in the silence at the edge of the maple grove.

"Fuck. I fought for America. I bled for Vought. I gave so damn much to my country, to Vought. And what did I get? I was betrayed, packaged up by you people, and sold to those fucking Russians. The Russians tortured me in a lab for forty whole years. AK barrels fired into my mouth, blades stabbed into my eyeballs and corneas, blowtorches burned my body, all kinds of radiation experiments..."

"Then I crawled out of that hell, came back to America, hadn’t even gotten my ass warm in a chair yet, and now fucking Vought wants to get rid of me again. Huh? Why? Fuck you!"

The edge of the maple grove fell silent for a moment.

Wind passed through the maple leaves, lifting a few dead leaves into a spin.

"Because we hate you."

Crimson Countess’s voice sharpened. The curve of her lips, once something he had praised as beautiful, was now filled with venom.

"You know exactly how you treated everyone back then. You think being strong means you can order anyone around? You think because you’re powerful, you get to act like you’re everyone’s father?"

"Soldier Boy."

The Supe sent by Vought, standing behind her, spoke with undisguised mockery in his voice and slowly clapped twice.

"I have to admit, you really are powerful. Normandy, the Ardennes, Nicaragua. Your combat records in Vought’s archives are half a meter thick. But honestly? You’re uncontrollable. That’s the point. Vought doesn’t need an uncontrollable hero, no matter how many merits he has or how strong he is. If you can’t be controlled, you get removed. This is business, not a personal grudge."

He spread his hands and smiled.

"Though for us, it counts as a personal grudge too. You’ve beaten too many of us and blocked too many people’s path. And no matter how strong you are, we are Vought’s real reserves, including the members of Payback. You are not leaving today."

"So, every member of Payback, and all you Supes Edgar sent, have you thought this through? You’re going to gang up on this country’s hero while the entire American public, and my son Homelander, are watching?"

A cold curve lifted the corner of Benjamin’s mouth.

He raised his hand and pointed his thumb at his own chest.

In the pocket on the front of his Supersuit, a phone camera was aimed directly at everyone.

The livestream was still running on the screen, and the viewer count was climbing at an exponential rate.

Benjamin took out the phone.

The crowd at the edge of the maple grove froze at the same time.

Crimson Countess’s red dress stirred in the wind. She stared at that dark camera lens, unable to say a word.