A/N: WARNING: SPOILERS FOR SEASON 3 ARE IN THIS CHAPTER

You've been warned.

Starlight was shaken. Extremely shaken.

Omni-Man. He was a new hero. He was saving people left and right. Said that they were similar.

And he had just revealed so much about The Seven… it made her regret joining, honestly.

She thought the Deep was bad? Granted, she had a very good reason to hate his guts, he did blackmail her for a blowjob, but still…

A-Train, a murderer.

Translucent, a predator.

Homelander… a rapist and a murderer…

These are the people she had to work hard to join? Scum of the Earth?

'Oh god.'

She stood in the bathroom, looking at herself in the mirror.

What had she gotten herself into?

Is she really the only one here who wants to do some good?

'No. Maeve. She broke her wrist saving those kids… right?'

Omni-Man had shown her that Vought saw them all as toys, tools. Instruments for their benefit.

And she had definitely learned that they weren't above staging crimes for the money.

She gulped, and pulled out her phone, dialing her mom's number.

She brought it up to her ear as she entered a stall, making sure the seat was down and sitting down on the toilet.

After a few rings, her mom answered.

"Annie?"

Annie felt tears beginning to well up in her eyes.

"Mom?"

"Annie? Are you okay?"

"Joining the Seven… it was a bad idea…"

"How could you say that?! After all the hard work you put-"

"I'm scared, Mom. I'm working with murderers and rapists. Not heroes."

Annie grit her teeth, trying no to let her mom know she was crying as her mother went silent on the other end of the line.

"...What?"

"Homelander, is a rapist, hurt some poor woman, Becca Butcher… and A-Train killed a woman last week, without a care in the world… Translucent is a sexual predator…"

She hiccuped as she cried into the phone. She knew she was stronger after what happened with The Deep, but she was not prepared for this.

Maybe another time, she would've been more prepared… but this? All at once?

She was scared. She truly was scared.

And now that Omni-Man had made sure everyone knew what Homelander was… how could they stop him if he…

"Annie?"

Annie only broke out into sobs, dropping her phone on the ground as she realized what kind of hellhole she had found herself in.

All that work, everything she had done…

Only to learn that it was all wasted.

Pain.

That was what he felt.

This was wrong.

The Homelander did not feel pain.

But that's what this was.

Wait, why was he just now waking up? He didn't remember going to sleep.

The last thing he remembered was-

No.

'Oh hell no.'

That copy cat. Omni-Man.

He had struck him, hurt him, instead of taking his deserved punishment.

Wait.

He had hurt him.

He had hurt him.

Omni-Man could hurt Homelander.

How?

Slowly, Homelander's eyes cracked open, and he was blind for a moment as his eyes adjusted through a bright light. He rolled his eyes as he slowly sat up, groaning in pain.

Pain. It was an unfamiliar sensation.

He didn't like it..

Standing up, Homelander found himself actually stumbling, groggy, as he moved.

There were some doctors there with him, of course, but they wisely stepped out of the way when he approached.

He made his way to the bathroom, stumbling inside, just barely avoiding falling on his face, and he leaned on a sink as he looked in the mirror.

Homelander froze.

His face. His beautiful, perfect face.

It was hurt. Marred.

His left eye was swollen, bruised black, if he had to guess, from Omni-Man's boot slamming on his face. His hair was a mess, twisted and tangled all the way around from the impact, instead of it's perfect combing.

Homelander looked at himself in the mirror, stunned.

Then he began panting.

The marble of the sink cracked under the pressure of his grip as he grunted in anger, over and over, his eyes turning red as he glared at the insulting visage staring back at him.

Yelling angrily, the noise loud enough that anyone who could've heard it would've lost their eardrums, Homelander drove his fist into the mirror, shattering it and cracking the wall behind it.

And all the same, he could only think about one thing.

He would find Omni-Man.

And he would kill him.

Nolan sighed as he stood guard at the theater.

It had been a slow day so far since he had returned from his incident with Translucent. Not much had happened today outside of one guy trying to get a little too grabby with another woman.

Other than that, Nolan hadn't really had to do much.

"Bored?"

Sam's voice startled Nolan slightly, and he turned to look at her, a smile on her face as she looked at him.

"Little bit. After what's happened in the last twelve hours, the excitement change is kind of odd. Besides, it's been a relatively slow day for me."

"Isn't that a good thing?" Sam asked, tilting her head in confusion.

Nolan chuckled. "Yes, I'm not saying it's bad. I'm just saying I'm bored."

Sam looked around. The lobby was pretty empty since most of their customers were in the middle of a film. Evan was back in his office, and Ellis was checking through the rooms to make sure everything was in good shape.

"There's not much to do right now. Wanna watch some Youtube videos?" Sam asked, looking back at Nolan, who raised an eyebrow.

"Huh?"

"Youtube!"

Nolan was a little confused. "Now?"

Sam nodded, grinning. "There's no one here, and we won't be busy for a while. Mr. Smyth don't care if we mess around as long as we are ready to work."

Nolan raised an eyebrow. He glanced up at the theater, before shrugging with a sigh. "Why not?"

"Yay!"

Sam ran off behind the counter, into the break room and pulled out two chairs that she brought back out behind the counter. She sat them up side by side before sitting down in one, gesturing for Nolan to take the other.

"Sit!"

Nolan chuckled, but complied, moving around the counter and plopping down next to her as she pulled out her phone and quickly went to Youtube.

"So, what do you want to watch?" Sam asked, looking up at Nolan.

Nolan looked at Sam and shrugged. "I was never really on Youtube much back home. Any time I was on was usually for instruction on how to fix something."

Sam balked. "Did you ever watch any funny videos?"

"No."

Sam looked at Nolan in disbelief, before furiously tapping away at her phone.

With his enhanced site, he could clearly see her type and search for 'funny cat videos'.

"Um, what are you-" Nolan's question was interrupted by Sam as she searched the results.

"Shush! Watch!" She ordered as she tapped a video, leaning closer to him so he could see it, and holding her phone so that she could watch it as well.

Nolan was confused at the start of the video. It was just a woman messing with a cat with a laser pointer.

He had never understood what was so funny about it.

Nolan watched as the woman moved the laser pointer up the wall, the cat following close behind. His eyes went wide when the cat stayed behind the laser pointer, digging it's claws into the wall with a repeated clicking sound as it crawled up the wall to quickly follow the laser pointer, until it was almost at the ceiling.

The unexpected and sheer absurdity of what looked to be a real recorded event had Nolan laughing harder than he'd care to admit, throwing his head back as he boisterously laughed, Sam giggling next to him.

"Hey, keep watching, there's more!" She said through her giggles, causing Nolan to keep watching through his chuckles.

Nolan watched, and the next one had him laughing just as hard, as it was a cat hiding under a table, vigorously clawing at a vacuum cleaner any time it came close.

Sam giggled as she looked up at Nolan, who had a face of pure joy on his face as he watched the video.

"Do cats really do things like this?" He asked between chuckles. Sam nodded, still giggling.

"Uh huh!"

Nolan continued to watch with Sam, still laughing as video after video of cats doing stupid and funny things kept popping up, causing both Nolan and Sam to laugh at the same time as they watched the videos.

It was a solid thirty minutes of entertaining cat videos, and every once in a while, Sam would glance up at Nolan through her giggles, just to look at his laughing face.

Sam smiled up at him, as he looked down at her.

"People really watch this for entertainment?"

Sam nodded. "Yeah, it's freaking hilarious."

Nolan nodded as he came down from his laughing. "I'll say." He turned to Sam, and chuckled. "It's official, I want a cat."

Sam chuckled. "If you say so." She looked up at Nolan. "Are we still on for coffee tomorrow, by the way?"

Nolan nodded, smiling. "Yes, we're still on for coffee."

Sam smiled back at him, and they simply smiled at each other for a moment.

Until Nolan yawned.

Sam raised an eyebrow. "Tired, oh great hero?" She asked with a grin.

Nolan nodded. "A little, I've been awake days now. Viltrumites are powerful, but we still need rest."

Sam looked at him, concerned. "Do you have somewhere to go?"

Nolan looked at Sam, smiling. "I'll find somewhere."

"So that's a no." Sam responded to Nolan's words.

Nolan chuckled. "I'll be fine."

Sam looked at Nolan seriously. "You've done so much for us, Nolan, and you're trying to bring down an evil super organization to boot. I'm not gonna let you stay out on the streets."

"Well I could-"

"Do you have the money yet?"

Nolan went silent.

"That's what I thought."

Nolan sighed as he looked at Sam. "So what's your idea?"

"You could stay with me." Sam proposed. "My couch unfolds into a bed, and it's not that expensive anyway. You're only trying to get enough money to get a place of your own, and I figure it's the least I can do."

Nolan stared at her, wide-eyed. "Um, are you sure?" Nolan wasn't about to refuse the offer, but he wanted to make sure she was fine with it. After all, they hadn't really known each other that long, only two days. Three, counting today.

Sam nodded. "Positive. If you'll accept, I'll take you there after work."

Nolan nodded, smiling. "Alright, sure!"

Sam grinned, and jumped up out of her seat. "Great! I'll see you then." She said, walking off to the register as people began leaving the theater rooms.

Nolan watched her, stunned, before chuckling as he stood up, and began to patrol the lobby full of people.

He knew full well why it didn't take her long to offer, but she hadn't done anything to make him distrust her, and he did need a place to stay.

With a sigh, he continued his day at work.

Because of his preoccupied thoughts and his focus on his job, he was unaware of the black suited masked supe on the roof.

Black Noir did whatever Stan Edgar asked, no questions asked.

After the events of Nicaragua, Edgar had kept him at Vought, brought him to the highest of highs, helped him through the lowest of lows.

He'd do what Stan Edgar wanted, no questions asked.

But this?

Noir could safely say that he felt nervous for the first time in ages.

Unlike many other heroes, he was not afraid of Homelander. Unlike many other heroes, he knew Homelander was controlled.

It probably also helped that since that fateful mission at the Cruz Chemical Plant, Homelander had seen him as his best friend.

Noir wasn't sure whether he was okay, or annoyed by that.

But Homelander was controlled, that's why he didn't fear him.

But Omni-Man? The one that Stan Edgar had sent him to spy on? Well, Noir would be stupid not to feel a little fear.

Vought had been able to track Omni-Man by, instead of using a tracking chip since Omni-Man lacked one, monitoring objects in the air.

This place, Kirkman Theater, is where he was last monitored.

Stan Edgar had sent Noir to check it out, and if Omni-Man were here, spy on him, see what he could figure out.

Thing is, this movie theater? There was no way for him to get inside and sneak around without somebody noticing him, and if that happened, he knew he was either dead or done.

So, he would have to wait, and hope that if Omni-Man were here, he would leave soon.

He wanted to tail him, get some info, and get home.

Black Noir did what Stan Edgar asked, no questions asked.

Black Noir did not want to provoke Omni-Man.

For the first time in his life… Black Noir was scared.

A/N: Well, there's that. Yeah, after watching the first three episodes of Season 3, and learning a little of what Noir was like in his early days, I decided to give little more depth to him. Originally it was going to end with the cliffhanger of Noir being on the roof, but I wanted to give him more depth, instead of just going with the usual route of 'He's mysterious and psychotic' that many people have tried to adapt in their fics from the comics. Now we know that Noir is his own person. He has emotions. And while he has definitely done some shady shit on behalf of the company, he's never done anything to imply that he enjoys the kind of shit that Homelander and other supes do. In fact, he's had evidence towards the opposite, like when he tried to comfort Naqib's son, even though I can almost guarantee that some heroes wouldn't care and others, like Homelander, would've killed the boy too, labeling him as an 'unfortunate casualty'.

As for how they tracked Nolan, considering the resources they have it's not hard to believe that they have radars that let them track down Nolan my monitoring his flight path. They aren't as advanced as the Global Defense Agency from Invincible, but they are definitely more advanced than a regular company. They are literally another version of Umbrella from Resident Evil, just with superheroes instead of bioweapons.

It's meant to show that even though he's much more powerful than this world's heroes, if he wants to keep his hero life separate from his civilian life, it's not going to be as easy as it would be in his home Earth.

Anyway, that's all for now, and I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I shall see all of you, in the next one.