Omni Boys

by AUfan62

While fighting both Kevin and Vilgax at Niagara Falls both them and Ben get sucked into a portal created by the Null Void projector. Only it’s not the Null Void they land. They land in a world where Superheroes are just a bunch of corporate puppets and think they can do whatever they want. But no it’s a real Hero’s Time.

9. Chapter 9: Revealed

Back again. I forgot to give credit to my co-writer for this story Star Saber21. They have been such a big help with the concept, dialogue, and even just being able to bounce idea's back and forth.

Anyway I hope you enjoy this chapter, as much as I did writing it.

Illinois, Outskirts of Chicago

Outside a Vought sponsored Bee sanctuary the Superhero Stinger, who wore a bee inspired outfit, finished explains to the local news the purpose of her mission. To bring up the population of Bombus Affinis, more commonly known as the Rusty Patch Bumble Bee. Which was vital to food security and functioning ecosystems.

In reality the smiling blond beauty with a sunny disposition hated bee's. Which was ironic because her power's was like that of The Deep's with ocean creatures, only she could control bee's to do what she wants like she was their queen.

As the camera's left Stinger went inside to do work and monitor her 'friends.' The habitat was among a large complex of other habitats that house other bee's. All growing up in their natural habitat without being exploited for honey production.

Or so they thought.

In reality a bunch of the habitats were honey factories in disguise. Stinger walked into one with disdain as she observed her servants. Bright side about having Bee controlling powers, you could walk around without worried about getting stung. Unlike the human workers who had to where suits to protect themselves as they extracted the honey.

"How much do we have so far?" Stinger asked one of the human workers.

"Doing well so far." He replied. "We're on track to do about 15 percent more than last season." He assured her.

"Not enough I need at least 20 percent." Stinger told him.

The worker looks at her. "That's gonna be hard, you'd have to get them to work twice as hard and they'd likely work themselves to death." He points out.

Stinger just sighs, before activating her powers and her eyes glowing yellow. Suddenly the bee's in the habitat begin working with more intensity than before. The bee themed supe then turns to the work. "You see that." She tells him then adds. "These fucking dumb little shits will do anything I tell them."

In truth she has made them do things for her entertainment since her childhood. From stinging bullies to repeatedly stinging her boyfriend when she caught him in bed with another girl. He was in a coma now.

"Achoo!" A voice said from above.

"Bless you." The two said without thought.

"Thank you." The voice from above replied, then their eyes widened. Looking up they saw Stinkfly on the ceiling with a phone in his hand. "Gotta fly." He tells them starts flapping his wings and flies down and heads for the door.

"No!" Stinger shouts, then commands all the bee's to attack Stinkfly. But the insect like alien merely fires his goo at the bee's, making them fall to the ground. Afterwards he flew out the door.

Soon Stinger's phone starts buzzing, it being programmed to alert her about any news of herself. "Shit." She grits already seeing a video Shifter made with her tagged onto it.

This is gonna ruin her career.

New York, Supe Club

At the same club Hughie and Butcher went to weeks ago when they first met, Wraith was sneaking in. Well more like invisibly going through walls. Good thing it was dark cause then he would've burned up trying to find this place. His first attempt lead him to a non-supe strip club. His second was a drug den. His third was a giant freezer full of meats. Turns out four times is the charm.

Passing through the wall he entered and saw all kinds of debauchery going on. Hearing moans above him he looked and saw a floating supe push into a woman. "Yeah fuck!" He grunted as he achieved release, letting the woman go.

Instead of hitting the floor, Wraith zoomed in and grabbed her. The fairly attractive woman giggled while brushing away some of her blonde hair, as if not realizing she could've broken a limb. Likely because of some drugs. Wraith then set her on the couch where another naked woman was smoking. Completely ignoring the invisible force that put the other there.

"Where is it?" Wraith asks himself looking around.

He then hears a sizzling noise, like something's being burned. Turning he see's a tan women, with black hair wearing a leather outfit putting out cigarettes on a tied up naked supe. "Duck that burns." The supe tells her.

The woman then takes out a small blow torch, used for making cream brûlée, and lights it. "I didn't give you permission to speak." She says then stars burning him.

"UGH FUCK!" The supe exclaims as his skin burns, heals then burns again.

Wraith then floats on until he see's Ezekiel. Apparently after the Chimera incident he stayed in New York to help give people spiritual guidance. But now he was off duty and was, according to Butcher, 'being the biggest meat in the manwhich.' While his top half was pinned against wall kissing a guy, while the lower half was a dozen feet away, and the stretched out torso was rising up and down.

'Caught him in the act, just need the footage." Wraith thought as he looked around. After only seeing more sexual acts going on he continued to snout her room. Finding more of the same.

"Next time I'm asking for geographical coordinates, at least the meat-locker I accidentally found I got some salami out of it." Wraith said to himself as he found himself outside, again.

After several minutes of passing through walls and seeing all kinds of things. One of which involved squirrels and a bathtub of cheese. He finally found.

"Finally!" Wraith cheered seeing the security cameras. As the man monitoring them turned to see what was behind him Wraith knocked him out. The ghost like extra terrestrial then downloaded the footage of Ezekiel. "And send." He said as he sent the video of Ezekiel from multiple angles to Ben.

Then, after learning from his mistakes, flew up to avoid running into anything weird. However he ended up in a place he didn't think he would here.

"Are you one of ghosts from downstairs?" An excited little girl with red hair asked at small table.

"Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhh." Wraith replied. "That depends, do you think they're nice ghosts or evil ghosts?" He asks.

"Are you a nice ghost?" She asks.

"I'm trying to be." Wraith tells her.

"Good enough. Tea?" She offers holding out a plastic cup.

"Sure why not." Wraith replied then 'sat' on one of the small plastic chairs. "Two sugars please." He requested.

"You know it's not real right?" The girl told him.

"Then I'll take some of those Oero's I see poking from under the bed." He gestures.

"Okay." The girl replies. "So what goes on downstairs?" She asks bring over the package. "Daddy says he rents it out to Ghosts for money cause they have nowhere to go."

"Well actually..." Wraith begins to tell her, regardless of her age.

Indiana, Meridian Hills

As a luxury home worth over 2 million dollars the genius hero Psypher was in his boxers in his living room enjoying the show. His caucasian brown haired wife was making out with their dark haired Korean maid and Mexican nanny.

Too the world Psypher was a genius who made a breakthrough in Fusion energy. However he was not. In reality he was a supe who controlled peoples minds, but the public did not know it. Most, including many in Vought, thought he just had telekinetic and mind reading powers. And he used that for his own purposes.

In reality his Wife and the nanny were the geniuses who figured it out. But thanks to his mind control powers and telepathic powers he took credit for it. His wife is a professor at the university and the nanny wasn't the nanny, she was a college student at the university who was in his wife's class and Psypher was attracted to. The only person who came close to discovering this was the maid who originally wanted to work with him as an assistant.

As the three hypnotized women undressed Psypher mentally commanded his wife to stop and come over. "Yes husband." The blonde asked, and after receiving the the mental reply she got on her knees and began sucking his member.

"Yeah fuck." He sighed in pleasure. Then he commanded the Mexican college girl to rub his shoulders.

"Of course sir." She told him once as she walked over and began massaging him. "Perhaps you'd like something a snack?" She questioned with a robotic smile.

"I am a bit hungry." Psypher agree's then commands the forced Korean maid to make him a sandwich.

"Of course. Anything else?" The former assistant replied.

Psypher took a moment to reply as he finished in his wife's mouth and commanded her to keep going. "Yeah those pills and tell the brat to hurry up with the paperwork." He ordered.

"Of course." The Korean replied then went to the built in intercom. "Audrey your father is requesting for those papers to be graded immediately." She says.

"Ok I'm almost done. Afterwards should I get the bedroom ready for you all. Perhaps maybe call the mother of my friend to join again?" Was the reply.

"Fuck yeah." Psypher told her.

"Ok I just 10 more minutes if that's alright. I wanted to finish sooner, but the scheduling for your keynote speech took longer."

"Just don't keep me waiting." He commands.

"Oh of course father I wouldn't dream of it."

Upstairs

A twelve year old girl with braces was hurriedly working on a device while glancing at the locked door. This was Audrey Begay a Native American orphan who was adopted by Psypher's wife before they met. She was a child prodigy and wanted to be an engineer and had to restrain herself from screaming to the world that she and her adopted mom and her student were the ones who made that breakthrough.

Psypher did try to mind control her too but for some reason she couldn't be controlled. She wasn't sure if it was because she was a child or that maybe the metals in her braces interfering. Either way she was immune and thankfully Psypher was none the wiser. Also fortunate was that he only made her do paperwork, chores and other physical labor.

But thanks to a message from Shifter he sent her plans to make a homemade EMP device that nullified Psypher mind waves. And hopefully free her mom and the others from his control. "Please please work." She prays as she attaches things to a record player, like a cell phone from 2004, headphones, a Nickleback CD, pieces of lead, manganese, thallium, some white bread and an empty box of doughnuts. The doughnuts were originally a snack, but it turns out the box material would help amplify the waves.

Scene Cut 9 minutes later

"Ready!" Audrey said cheerfully despite wanting to vomit.

"Good." Psypher replies as he gets up.

Suddenly the record player is thrown down and waves are emitted sending everyone to the floor. As Psypher passed out the three under his control began waking up after a much needed slumber.

Vought

"Fuck!" Madelyn exclaimed throwing the remote down as CNN, CBS, FOX News, BBC and whatever other news network except VNN blasted about Stinger, Ezekiel and Psypher. Hippies and animal/insect activists were mad at stinger for exploiting bee's for profit. Nearly all the women and many men were upset about a man abusing his power to not only take credit for a women's work but also enslave them. People were also eating up the story about a lucky brilliant minded genius child that stopped him.

Lastly one of their most successful operations of the last few decades essentially got burned to the ground. Not only was Ezekiel being lamented as a hypocrite he also received a lot of negative reactions from people who were strongly against the LGBTQ community. Not to mention a significant portion of the LGBTQ community are conflicted since although they understand about hiding who he is are mad that he encouraged the stance against them.

To top that off Shifter's been changing his marketing strategy. He's been appearing all over the news.

First in Portland he called out Stormfront for being to rough with criminals who only committed minor crimes. It was made worse with a podcaste pointing out how aggressively she treats criminals when they're a certain type of people.

Then XLR8 was seen in Ohio defacing a small monument to Payback and calling out Tek Knight for not having actual powers. Along with breaking a girls back, and even though she signed the NDA, according to Lilly Choi the NDA said nothing about her mentioning she signed an NDA. That combined with the wheel chair was a PR grenade.

Next was him going to Texas to point out how many people have been killed or injured because of Safeguard's gun stance. (Another OC I made up) Where people were not even screened before being allowed to purchase guns. And then reinforced this by stopping a shooting in Tennessee. Though he still thought he was in Texas when he did and when informed replied that 'oh well there's really not much of a difference.'

Finally he went to California and crashed a birthday party at a park for an underprivileged kid. All while Crimson Countess was photographed enjoying the luxuries of a Kardashian birthday party. To top it off it looked like he really had fun in that bouncy house. It's like he really was a ten year old kid. Plus he got Kylie Jenner to wish the kid a happy birthday too on Instagram.

Not even her best marketing team could've predicted this strategy. And last year they managed to turn Tek Knight's rape of a mountain lion and killing the cubs into protecting a town that hadn't had a mountain lion attack.

"List me options come on." The senior VP ordered.

"Oh w-well we could just ignore it, but that might prove his point. Accept some of it or maybe just deny it." Ashley lists off. After a few days off and a lot of drinking she managed to come back to work without her heart racing a million miles a second.

"That's it?" Stillwell questions her minion. And when Ashley sadly nods she sighs. "Fine then start figuring out what can we accept and what can we deny and send all of our so called 'hero's' on PR tour's." She orders and Ashley complies and leaves.

Sitting down at her desk Madelyn sighed as she took out a wine bottle and began pouring it into her coffee. Then once it was full she began drinking and once she was done she leaned back and groaned. "Fuck." What was Shifter doing now? Probably saving a kitten.

Nicki Manaj Concert

The proclaimed Queen of Rap was performing for thousands of screaming fans meanwhile backstage events were taking place.

"Eeeeeeeeee." Elena and Janine squealed while wearing backstage passes, that may or may not have been fake. Prior to that XLR8 zoomed them after 15 minutes of constant pleading.

"This is so cool!" Janine exclaimed.

"I know." Elena agreed, with both jumping up in excitement. "Think he'll take us to see Shenseea?" She asks.

"I didn't miss it did I?" XLR8 asks showing up out of the blue. Apparently there was a guest rapper who was performing and was nearly kidnapped, but because XLR8 was nearby he took care of it.

Nicki then began rapping quickly in a single breath to one of her songs. "If that's not talent then I don't know what is." Ben tells them and they agree.

"We got a problem!" A panicked stage worker comes to tells the stage manager. "Apparently the rapper has an allergy to nuts and he had peanut M and M's. He can't perform!" She tells her.

"WHAT!" The stage manager replies in shock. "Who did that. I want their ass fired!"

"It was a company mistake, the bag said regular M and M's." One of the male stage workers said holding up the famous candy. It was the standard chocolate package but inside were the large nut filled kind.

"Who cares! We need a special guest rapper in less than 5 minutes or we can get sued for false advertising by some greedy scammers!" The stage worker who brought the news exclaimed.

"He's a professional rapper!" Elena tells them patting the alien hero.

"He is?" The stage manager asks in surprise.

"He is?" Janine adds with surprised confusion.

"I am?" Ben replies.

"He is." Elena answers then adds. "Cardi B even likes him." She fibs.

He then remembers the raps that a fan sent him. "Oh yeah, but I don't write my own stuff." He tells them.

"Neither does Cardi, get him set up." The Stage manager directs.

"We don't have time to get him in hair and makeup." The worker points out.

"I don't have hair and you can't improve on perfection." XLR8 tells them then runs off.

"Does he know when his que is?" One person asks.

"He usually has pretty good timing." Elena tells them.

"Who are you anyway?" The manager asks, finally point that out.

Scene Cut, stage

"New York stand the fuck up!" Nicki shouts hyping up the crowd. "All the barbs in the house I gotta special treat for ya'll. Come out-"

Instead of saying the intended guest rapper's name a whoosh was heard as a blur flew fast the star rapper. "It's Hero Tiiiiiiime!" Ben, or Shifter, exclaimed after grabbing a mic.

Suddenly music began playing as the crowd starting cheering and he began rapping.

I'm fast on the track

Running circles around you

Like my color palette

I leave 'em black and blue

XLR8 then begins running around the stage and Nicki as she keeps her composure and begins dancing and bopping to the music.

They can try to land a punch

But when they're trying to

I can dodge 'em all with a zip and zoom

Nicki then pretends to punch XLR8 who just zooms out of the way.

I'm coming through

I'm real quick with my feet

Going by in a blur

Supersonic speed

Try to keep your eyes locked on me

If you blink the next thing you'll see

Is you facing defeat

XLR8 runs around the stage in a blur then stops at one side of the stage.

OH!

Going Turbo!

Runs to the other side to prove his point.

No speed limit, you're just too slow

Leave 'em in the dust everywhere I go

Only for them it's the end of the road

OH!

XLR8 runs to the front edge of the stage.

I was here then I was there

Runs to another part of the stage in a blink of an eye.

I'm not slow like A-Train I swear

Shakes his head.

I got places to be

Beat the baddies quickly

All you'll feel is a gust of air

He then runs out so fast Nicki's hair gets blown back. The crowd then went wild before Nicki continued.

Scene Cut, Backstage

"That was awesome!" XLR8 says with excitement to Elena and Janine when he gets back there. "Should I do an encore?" He asks.

"Maybe after stopping that fire." Elena tells him and he runs off.

"How does he know where the fire is?" Janine asks.

"There is no fire." Elena replies. "Just needed to get him out of here before he gets a bigger head. Plus it's New York there's always crime." She adds.

At a Hotel

In an average hotel bedroom the lights were dimmed as Hughie and Annie were kissing. As they took their clothes off Hughie began kissing her neck earning pleasurable moans in response. Meanwhile Annie was running her hands on his back.

Then Hughie gasped as Starlight reached and grabbed his member. "Oh." He responded as she lightly stroked him. Then without warning Annie pushed him on the bed, being careful not to hurt him.

The hero then begins straddling Hughie as they reconnect their lips. Annie's hands going to Hughie's hair and his hands to her back and hips. Hughie then begins going lower and latched onto one of her breasts.

A short while later they've flipped over and Annie is on her back as Hughie thrusts into her. The two gasp, pant and moan until they reached climax, with Starlights eyes glowing bright briefly. Once done both smile and giggle.

(A/N hope that was good. Not really a pro at writing intimate details)

Shortly after

"This is all really nice." Annie begins to say, as she and Hughie cuddle together.

"Mm-hmm. But..." Hughie replies then looks at her and add "There is a "but" coming right?" He asks unsure.

"Okay. But why did you bring me to a hotel? Hmm? And not your place?" Annie wonders, then adds. "And come to think of it why haven't we gone to your place? I don't even know where you live?"

"Well the simple answer is that I just moved." Hughie starts to answer.

"And the more complicated answer?" Was the reply.

"I kinda have a roommate or two and they're not a big of uh..." Hughie drags not knowing how to reply.

"Big what, girl fan? Sex fan?" Starlight lists off, since she's received a lot of criticism from guys calling her incompetent and people calling her a slut.

"Not a big Vought fan." He tells her.

"So what you're ashamed of me?" She questions hurt.

"No no no no it's not like that it's uh Um." Hughie stutters as he tries to backtrack.

"I'm messing with you?" Annie tells him and he breathes a sigh of relief. "So are they like activists or just hate big corporations?" She wonders.

"I'm not really sure." Hughie tells her honestly. "I think they were just screwed by Vought somehow."

"I know the feeling." Annie tells him.

"Is there a reason you asked about the Hotel? Is something wrong?" Hughie questions.

"Look, you got to understand that my dad was nothing but corny jokes and expensive gifts, until he was gone, and all the money along with him." She explains. "I know that that's not you, but..." She pauses.

"I need to know that the hotel is a nice thing and not a red flag thing." She tell him. "I mean you're still kind of a mystery and I haven't seen your job or your place.

"I quit my job." He starts to tell her. "Um, I'm sorry, I-I... I really should've told you." Rubs his face in slight embarrassment. "It's just after Robin, programming other people's remotes felt kind of pointless."

"And yeah, I mean, you can-you can meet my dad, but you're gonna regret asking that." He adds.

"So everything's okay?" Annie asks, for a final reassurance.

"It's great." Hughie tells her. "No red flags."

Next Day Hideout

The boys, and girls, were getting ready, with Butcher, MM and Frenchie dressing in black suits, with only Frenchie having a tie. Butcher and MM wore black sunglasses and left their jackets unbuttoned with a pistol each.

Kimiko was also wearing a business suit, for women, with a long sleeve jacket over her dress shirt and black pants. She also had subtle but high end jewelry, heels and a Gucci hand bag.

Hughie also dressed in a suit, but was grey and significantly cheaper. But he, along with Frenchie, did not have any weapons. Instead he had multiple briefcase of weapons and a backpack to carry. Frenchie had just one brief case.

Elena meanwhile had a green hoodie, black pants and a tablet. "Okay so Hikari Suzuki of Hashimoto industries has a meeting with Stan Edgar." Elena reads over gesturing to Kimiko who was putting on some earrings. "Due to her lack of American travels she travels with her translator Pierre." Points to Frenchie. "She is also daughter of Japanese Billionaire Hiroto Suzuki so she's flanked by former Navy Seal André Stevens and former NZSAS Thomas Mallory." Gestures to MM and Butcher.

"Meanwhile James Smith is the trusty pack mule who will do whatever you ask." Points to Hughie then to herself. "And I am her ward, Angela Lopez, who was abused by my parents and won't trust anyone but you guys."

"And while we fool these corporate twats Benji will take the worlds mightiest cunts to the cleaners." Butcher adds with a smile.

"For like the third time." Elena reminds him.

"Only three?" Butcher questions. "Feels like more than that."

"I'm just counting the ones that people saw in public." Elena informed.

"Ah right." Butcher replies. "Who do you think he'll use? The pyro guy?"

"Heatblast." Hughie corrects. "I think he'll use Diamondhead." He guesses.

"XLR8 is his best bet." Mother's Milk reasons while triple checking over the brief cases that were full of weapon parts. Then locked them all.

"Personally my favorite is Fourarms." Frenchie says, while adjusting his tie. "I could finally pleasure six women all at once by myself if I could turn into him.

Elena scrunches her face in confusion. "But what about the extra two-."

"Hey! Where's Monique, Janine and Wraith?" Hughie nearly shouted.

"Therapy." Elena answers gesturing to the red light above one of the 'bedrooms'.

Scene Cut

Wraith dressed in his therapist outfit was scribbling notes as Monique and Janine sat in the bed. "Now that we've gone over Monique's fear of being a bad mother let's go over Janine's lack of emotional reaction from this ordeal."

"I'm honestly fine. It was scary at first but getting mad won't help. Especially cause it's Vought's fault nobody else's." Janine replied.

"Ok." Wraith replied, content with that response.

"Ok!" Monique repeated. "That's it? When I said I was fine you said it meant freaked out, insecure and what not."

"Firstly it's Frustrated, Insecure, Neurotic and Emotional. F I N E." Wraith corrected. "Second she said it with her eyes that although this situation is not ideal she's accepted it at least for the time being." He reason.

"The eyes are the windows to the soul mom." Janine adds.

"Third you seemed jealous of your daughter when you said that. Let's talk about it." Wraith points out.

"Why did I agree to this again?" Monique questions with a sigh.

"Cause you have a lot of deep emotional baggage that you can't seem to healthily unload." Wraith answered. "So much so you can't trust your husband and are putting your mental health in the hands of a stranger who's a ghost like extraterrestrial with no psychological degree or any schooling." He adds.

"Now explain when you first got jealous of Janine." Wraith requests.

Scene cut

"Think they're just bitching about you?" Butcher asks MM, who doesn't reply.

"Ben says they're starting to set up." Elena tells them. "Let's go." She orders.

"Hold up, last I checked you gotta be this tall to give orders." Butcher jokes, holding his hand up as if measuring for carnival ride.

"Last I checked British people are suppose to stop for tea every five minutes." Elena shoots back.

"You know that's just once a day right." Butcher informs as he gathers the gear. Looking towards the rest of the gang he adds. "No time to lose, let's go." And they all get a move on.

Central Park

As workers were setting up for a makeshift press announcement Homelander watched from a distance away. He was mentally readying himself for when Shifter no doubt try to ruin his career again. While he may not have been physically attacking Vought Hero's lately he still found a way to be a thorn in Vought's side. Only upside the Seven leader saw was that he didn't have to use the lame talk points.

He just hoped his team wouldn't screw it up.

Vought Tower

Frenchie, followed by Kimiko, Elena and chip and flanked by MM and Butcher walked into Vought tower with confidence. Everyone except Elena, she had her hood up, head down, with some hair falling forward and timidly staying by Kimiko's side while holding her hand. Hughie brought up the rear with a struggle, carrying a backpack and two briefcases full of hidden weapons and a bomb.

As they got to the front desk the lady, Samantha, stopped what she was doing and looked at them. "Hi how can I help you?" She asks with a perfect customer service smile.

"Hello." Frenchie begins. "This is Hikari Suzuki." He gestures to Kimiko who maintains a RBF (Resting Bitch Face). "We have a meeting with Stan Edgar."

"One second." Samantha replied, before typing several keys on her desktop. "Strange."

"Is there a problem?" Frenchie asks, a little worried.

"Nothing it's just I look at Mr. Edgar's schedule multiple times a day and this wasn't here earlier." Samantha told him.

"Oh, maybe it is a glitch or something?" Frenchie replies.

"Maybe, but let me message his secretary just in case." Samantha tells him. "I hope that's not a problem?" She asks.

Flashback

As they were nearing the building Elena spoke. "Remember they might try and test if you're fake, I already have the schedule just stay calm and let her confirm it a thousand times. She's probably just gonna work on the book she's writing." Pause. "I hacked into her computer and it's pretty good."

"Oh what's it about?" Hughie asked intrigued.

"Fucking off that's what." Butcher tells them.

Flashback over

"No problem madame." Frenchie replied with a smile then went to 'speak' to Kimiko. In reality he just pretended to barely whisper in her ear.

"Oh there it is, Hashimoto industries yes." Samantha says with a smile. "I guess I just missed it I'm so sorry." She lies.

"No problem." Frenchie tells her the asks. "What floor again? I believe it was number ten, but I'm not sure."

Samantha types a few keys and. "Yes floor ten conference room seven, lucky you." She tells him then adds. "Although there might be a bit of a delay cause he's in a meeting and has warned it might go on a bit longer."

"That is okay." Frenchie replied then they were escorted to security for their visitor badges.

As the gang was heading to the elevator they had to pass through security. Which wasn't a problem so long as they didn't open the cases, containing the weapons they hopefully wouldn't have to use. Thanks to Chop flying in and temporarily messing with the scanners. "All clear." The security guard said mundanely.

Hughie smiled then released a breath of relief as he took the things back and they all headed towards the elevator. Fortunately nobody else was in so they were alone for a bit.

"Holy fucking shit fuck." Hughie breathed when Elena announced she looped the elevator camera.

"What are you so nervous about Hugh?" Butcher asked. "You've done this before, should be easy peasy."

"Lemon squeezy Japanesey." Hughie paraphrased "It doesn't get any easier. Man I feel like I'm gonna puke."

"How do think I feel?" MM asked. "I'm burned, so if anyone recognizes me this whole thing is blown."

"Luckily this company, like a lot of others just worry money and are kinda racist." Elena tells them. "Though this thing has been going so smoothly."

"Is that a problem?" Frenchie asks with a bit of confusion.

"Yeah." Elena replies as if it were obvious. "I made back stories for all of us that we haven't even had a reason to use." She explained.

"Just enjoy it, cause if my experience with Butcher taught me anything it's that with him shit will hit the fan real fast." MM tells her as the elevator reaches it's floor. Soon they head for their conference room and wait, not for Edgar but for Ben.

"So what's his signal again?" MM asked.

"Oh we just wait for the news." Elena informs as she takes a seat and pulls out her phone. "Secret entrance is there and all you have to do is push the decorative diamond shape thingy's middle, left and right." She orders. Kimiko then takes the seat next to Elena facing the door with her arms crossed on the table.

"Guess we sit and look important." Butcher comments. "Just like a politician." He joked.

With Ben

He was in an arcade, an actual arcade with games from his dimension, minus Sumo Slammers. Still awesome though, and good a place to have his birthday party, when the day comes. Though he's not sure if he has to wait longer or shorter for his birthday in December.

As he finishes winning a bunch of tickets at Skee-Ball he got a notification on his phone. A News one about the Seven's, and subsequently Vought's, announcement at the park. Then oicking up his tickets he gave them to a random kid nearby and walked out.

(A/N: Anyone else miss going to real arcades)

Central Park

People and reporters were gathering around a small stage as the Seven (Six sans Translucent) stood on their. Homelander then walked up to the podium and got everyone's attention.

"Hello everyone." The Seven's leader begins. "I'm here to today with very." He pauses to take a breath, as if what he's trying to say is very difficult. "Very sad news." He continues with a another small pause. "It is with a heavy heart that I tell you that the Seven's very own Translucent is now being considered dead or missing."

This caused the crowd to erupt in shocked gasps, but Homelander stops them.

"Unfortunately we do not have confirmation of either, all we now is that for the past two weeks he has failed to check in from his classified mission. But we haven't given hope because-" He tries to finish but is interrupted.

By Music.

Whoa, Black Betty (Bam-ba-lam)

Whoa, Black Betty (Bam-ba-lam)

Whoa, Black Betty (Bam-ba-lam)

Whoa, Black Betty (Bam-ba-lam)

Is heard in the distance and people turn to hear.

Soon a motorcycle with an Upgrade color scheme is zooming around on the green.

She's from Birmingham (Bam-ba-lam)

Way down in Alabam' (Bam-ba-lam)"

The Upgrade cycle then pops a wheelie and starts spinning while going forward.

"Well, she's shakin' that thing (Bam-ba-lam)

Boy, she makes me sing (Bam-ba-lam)"

Lands on both wheels but is heading towards the stage in reverse.

"Whoa, Black Betty (Bam-ba-lam)

Whoa, Black Betty

Before hitting anyone the upgraded motorcycle did a vehicular backflip.

Bam-ba-laaam, yeah, yeah

Lands on stage next to Homelander who moved to the side a bit.

"What'd ya think?" Upgrade asked poking his head from the motor bike. "I was torn between Hero by Skillet or maybe Uptown Funk, but I heard this and decided to try it." He said.

Vought, meeting room

"Show's starting, let's go." Butcher said as he went to the decorative props and pushed them in order to open the wall. After hearing a click from each the wall suddenly became, a somewhat heavy, revolving door. Inside was dark and dusty save for a few old windows that were covered in dirt and grime.

There was just simply a stair well, somewhat worn from years of neglect. Each flight went up diagonally until it hit the wall then in the other side of the building.

"Let's go." Butcher ordered and they all rushed in and once they closed the door the cases were opened. Inside each of the briefcases were gun parts, tools and ammunition as well as some smoke grenades.

"So uh these things are safe... Relatively speaking right?" Hughie asked handing parts to MM as he assembled a rifle.

"Yeah relax shoot one them little red balls any cunt that gets hit is out like a drunk on Saint Pattie's Day." Butcher explains. After the Chimera incident Frenchie was able to convert the remainder of the red substance that knocked out Kevin into sort of tranquilizer rounds. They're smaller and loaded like bullets only instead of shooting bullets they shoot round capsules designed to shatter upon impact and release a small red cloud.

"You had time to test this shit on regular people?" Mother's Milk asked checking a gun three times before handing it to Hughie.

"I did and I was out like a light for hours." Frenchie said as he took off his suit jacket and untied his tie. "Best sleep I had without another women." He adds with a smile.

Kimiko then starts making the 'chop chop chop' motion with her hands to signify they should hurry up. "Yeah we have a lot of stairs then we still have to sneak in."

"Huh I can get cell service in here wow." Hughie says in the background as they begin walking up. He then goes to Live news footage of what was going on with Ben.

Central Park

"You think this is funny?" Homelander asked. "A beloved hero and friend could be dead and you're here making a joke about it. That is just disgraceful." In reality Homelander couldn't really care less, in fact he was glad Shifter was here, he could turn it to his advantage and another chance at payback.

"Well if I didn't know if he was dead probably, but he's not so stop pretending to care to get your ratings up." Upgrade tells him, getting some shocked murmurs among the crowd. Even the Seven look shocked.

"What?" Homelander asks, visibly surprised by this. After all Deep brought him the Zinc box with his invisible body parts it. 'Interesting?' He thought.

"Yeah I knocked him out and he's in a cell in some super secret location I have no idea where." Upgrade said to the cameras.

"So you admit to wrongfully attacking and imprisoning him?" Homelander asked, purposefully annunciating to make his tone and voice clear.

"I didn't imprison him, he was about to kill a potential whistleblower, and it wasn't wrong." Upgrade replied. "Well except for not telling the cops, but then again they wouldn't do anything and he likely wouldn't have said anything about Compound V." He adds with a shrug.

Homelander's eyes widen, as well as most of the Seven, except for Starlight who just wonder's what it is. The reporters and civilians then murmur amongst themselves as to what Shifter was talking about.

Vought Tower

Secret Stairwell

"Oh shit he just mentioned Compound V." Hughie informs.

"Well let's see if does something." Butcher says as they continue to walk.

With Stillwell

Madelyn Stillwell was watching the news and mention of Compound V she stood there for a moment. Ignoring Ashley's requests for orders. "FUCK!" Stillwell shouts grabbing a decorative piece of glass art and throwing it at a wall, shattering it into little pieces.

With Edgar

The well mannered CEO was looking at the news through his tablet in his office. And when he heard Shifter mention Compound V he... he smirked? Then took the letter a friend sent him and burned it with the others in the trash.

Central Park

"What are you talking about?" Homelander asked, feigning confusion.

"Compound V." Ben repeated. "What gives supes on this earth their real powers." He informed. "Compound V, V like Vought, Compound as in man made, by chemicals, not chosen by a greater power." He adds. "Otherwise why would that higher power choose for all supes to be part of Vought? Also if Vought is the only hero company, wouldn't that make them a monopoly, which is what this country stands against."

"Why am I here again?" Upgrade asked losing sight of what he was doing. "Oh yeah." Snaps a finger that pops out of the bike. "Destroying your company and your reputation by pointing out to the world that most Heroes in Vought are just supes who abuse their abilities for profit, power, pleasure and prostitutes. And hurting people when they're not pretending to save the world." He says.

"Also you guys threatened and tried to bribe me?" Upgrade said, remembering the time Stillwell tried to give him a job during his second quarrel with Black Noir way back when.

"Listen if you're gonna come up here and just spit lies to try and provoke me it's not gonna work." Homelander told him.

"I'm just stating true facts." Shifter replied. "Like Baku is the capital of Azerbaijan."

"Very funny." Homelander says with a smile then walks forward a bit. "Look if you want to fight just name the time and place and I'll be there."

Instead of giving a quippy reply Ben said. "Right here. Right now." Then fired his green optic beam at him without warning, sending Homelander into the park ground, landing on his back.

As the patriot supe was rising up Shifter rode off the stage and headed for him. Homelander fired his heat-vision at the alien cycle, but Ben just moved to the side to dodge. As well as the next two and when he got close enough he spun like a doughnut so his back wheels swept Homelander off his legs. As Homelander was on the ground Upgrade cycle rolled right over his torso before going into the city.

"Well that was lame, but I guess I should've expected it." Shifter taunted as he drove away.

As the rest of the Seven ran towards Homelander, who gritted his teeth as he rose back up. "After him." He ordered, eyes glowing red.

Vought, Secret Stairwell

"We uh, we almost there?" Hughie asked, running out of breath as he dragged himself on the stairwell, while leaning onto the rail. "Cause there's like an eighty-two percent chance I'm gonna throw up my lunch... from yesterday..." He tells them while struggling to climb up the stairs.

"Come on it's not that bad." Elena told him.

"Easy for you to say, you get to hitch a ride." Hughie points out as Kimiko is giving Elena a piggyback ride. Every now and then Kimiko would jostle Elena getting a giggle out of her.

"Enough whining this is the floor." Butcher told him.

"Oh thank god!" Hughie exclaimed with relief as threw himself down in the steps. "Can we just like... take five minutes?" He requests.

"Kid check to see if there's anyone out there." Butcher tells Elena.

The young girl gets off Kimiko's back and takes out her phone. Earlier she figured out how to hack into the Vought security cameras. But she could only get live feed for about a minute otherwise the failsafes implemented by her father years ago will activate, and all cameras go dark. Should that happen, best case scenario Vought knows there's someone in the building but not where. However unfortunately and fortunately the camera's on the floor with the records were down for maintenance. So they have no way of knowing if anyone was there.

Once in she checked the floors above and below she saw the closest people were her mother and some lab techs, a floor below them. "We're good." She tells Butcher before leaving the system.

"How do we open the door?" MM asked gesturing to the wall that lead to the hall.

"Like this." Elena said, looking over some old Vought schematics. Good thing city hall kept such extensive records of this buildings original structure from decades ago. Elena then pushed her hand on one part of the wall, then another and one more so like the entrance they took the door revolved.

They then started heading for the records room after putting the camera's on a loop. Butcher and Mother's Milk were in front with their guns ready, behind them was Hughie and Frenchie then Kimiko and Elena.

But suddenly Chip, who's been staying close to Elena this whole time, sudden starts to take off on his on accord. "Chip." Elena whispers then tries to command him to come back. But he doesn't listen and instead goes down a different hall instead.

Elena then follows him and when Kimiko noticed this she goes to. Without telling the Boys.

With Ben

Ben was racing away from the Seven throughout the city. Thanks to Upgrade's powers and his quick video game reflexes he was able to avoid A-Train, though just barely. Still he couldn't run forever, otherwise they would know it's a distraction.

So pulling a 180 he changed his form to that of Arcee of Transformers Revenge of the Fallen. Then using his right arm as a canon fired multiple green round at A-Train who dodged them all. But was hit by the shockwave from an exploding car knocking him away.

Homelander though was flying towards Upgrade-Arcee, who transformed back into a bike and slid down on the side. So Homelander flew right over him. Upgrade then increased his speed towards the other Seven members that tried to follow.

Seeing Maeve, Noir and Starlight he popped a wheelie and reved his engine before further increasing his speed. Using the rear view mirrors he saw A-Train was coming behind him at high speed. "Come to papa." Ben said to himself as he formed a thruster on the left side of his back wheel. When A-Train was about ten to twenty feet from reach Ben he activated the thruster. Causing Ben to do a full 360 rotation and hit the Speedster with his back wheel and into a wall.

"Uh." A-Train groaned along the cracked wall before falling to the ground.

Upgrade then began jumping on top of cars as Starlight fired her light blasts and Noir threw several daggers. Then after a few times Ben rode along the side of the building and when he did Maeve jumped at him.

Upgrade then jumped off and forced into Arcee, but from Transformers Prime. "Take this!" Ben shouted as he formed arm blasters and fired green lasers at the Amazonian like warrior.

The lasers hit Maeve, who fell back to the ground. After this Ben focused each arm blaster to Black Noir and Starlight. Both of whom managed to avoid the hits even as Ben landed. But before Upgrade-Arcee could choose his next target, Deep, who was so far ignored, swung his trident.

Surprisingly it hit and Ben took a step back. "Fuck this!" Deep shouted as he tried to stab Ben with the Trident, but the shapeshifter leaned to the right and split the gold painted reinforced steel prop with a tonfa blade chop.

"Shit." Deep muttered, before receiving an uppercut.

Before Ben can even decide how he wants to follow that up, he has to avoid a light blast from Starlight. He responds with a right arm laser blast then has to duck from a punch from Maeve. Then rises up with a back hand tonfa blade, which Maeve has to jump back from.

Noir then takes several smoke bombs and threw them at Ben engulfing in a smoke cloud. Homelander then finally flew back fired his heat vision in the smoke. Metal being sliced was heard before A-Train zoomed around the smoke clearing it. But all that remained was a sliced up MTT 420-RR Motorcycle.

"Did we get him?" Deep asked as he got up from the ground.

Noir just shook his head and A-Train said. "Nah can't see his symbol thingy."

"Think he ran?" Maeve asks as they begin forming a circle to discuss.

"No I don't think so." Starlight chimes. "He doesn't run away when he has the upper hand."

"Either he ran and did this to make us look like dumb fucks, or he's trying to lure us into a trap." Homelander summarized. "Either way he doesn't wanna really fight."

"Na-na-na-na, na-na, na

Na-na-na-na na-na

Na-na-na-na, na-na, na

Na-na-na-na na-na."

Was then heard from one of the cars. They turned to see a normal parked car nearby playing the radio or a CD.

"Na-na-na-na, na-na, na

I wanna start a fight!"

Na-na-na-na, na-na, na

I wanna start a fight!"

It sings as if sending a message. Which is silenced via Homelander's heat vision slicing it in half. But that wasn't it.

"I got the Eye of the tiger and the thrill of the fight!" Homelander then destroys another car on the other side of the street.

Then comes

"I'M AWAKE I'M ALIVE!" Car is destroyed.

"Stand my ground and never back down!" Another car sounds before it's destroyed.

"Where the FUCK is he!?" Homelander demands to know feeling annoyed. Not only was the music annoyingly symbolic, it was also much louder to him. Seemed to work as they didn't hear anymore music or sounds.

As Homelander sighs in relief he and the other hear from behind. "BET YOU DIDN'T SEE THIS COMING!" Turns out Shifter took control of a drone and used the music player on the phone's Bluetooth to connect to different cars to play music to disguise the sound of his approach. Now the drone released a powerful green pulse that sent all the supes flying.

Upgrade then took several cars and formed into Bulkhead (Human Size) from Transformers prime and charges at a slowly rising Homelander. "I hit you like a wreeeeecking ball!" He sings before swinging a wrecking ball hand at a downed Homelander sending him into a wall.

Then runs towards a slowly rising Black Noir and Deep before saying. "Creature double feature!" Then jumps up and slams them back to the ground. Maeve then slams his back and as she goes for another hit he swings his wrecking ball hand and quips. "Swing and a hit." Then forms blasters and aims it at Starlight. "Light this up." He quips and fires it at her.

"Gah!" Upgrade-Bulkhead grunts as Homelander threw a car at him knocking him into a wall. The Seven leader then flew where Ben landed and punched threw it, aiming for the head. Only he hit concrete.

"The fuck?" Homelander questioned in confusion, which didn't last long as a smaller arm punched threw the car and fired. This knocked Homelander back but he could see Shifter's new Upgrade form as he pushed off the car. This time into Wheeljack. "If you're trying to ruin my day, you're gonna have to try a lot harder."

Homelander just growls lowly as his eyes glow red. "Come on pretty boy, let's dance." Upgrade-Wheeljack said bringing a mask to cover the lower half of his face then runs towards Homelander.

The caped supe then tries to fly at Shifter, but Upgrade counters this by transforming into Wheeljacks vehicle mode. Since he was aiming high and couldn't come to a quick stop he flew over Shifter, who quickly maneuvered himself with a 180 degree turn and drove at full speed.

So when Homelander finally managed to slow down to to try and attack Shifter. All he saw was Upgrade-Wheeljack shift to his bit form as he received a right armed lariat. "Boom baby!" Shifter said as he landed.

Upgrade then runs and jumps with the intention to punch him while he's on the ground. But the Seven leader merely rolled over as the black and green striped robotic fist hit the concrete. Except Upgrade was able to grab the cape instead and threw him down the street. "And the winner for the supe Shot Put is..." He drags on.

Until Queen Maeve slides on the ground while slide kicking Upgrade-Wheeljack's left leg. This caused him kneel down with his knee on the ground with an umph, but was able to laser blast Maeve back with his left blaster hand.

Next though Noir flipped over Shifter and threw several smoke pellets at his face in the process. "Gah." He responded when the smoke blew up in his eyes. Homelander then fired his heat vision knocking Ben back then Starlight fired a light blast at his side. A-Train then began running around and hitting Ben in different directions.

Finally Homelander flew back then flew straight at Upgrade-Wheeljack sending him back some distance, while skipping the ground a few times. "Yeah I was never good at dancing anyway." Upgrade said before changing his arm blasters into missile launchers. "This place was about to blow anyway." Turns and fires two rockets.

Homelander and Starlight react instantly and blew them up when they were two-thirds of the way there. Creating a cloud of smoke where they were heading.

Upgrade ran before taking several car parts and transforming into vehicle mode. Then whilst in vehicle mode Ben launched several more missiles while firing green lasers from four guns that popped out of the headlights.

As expected the Seven try to dodge the attacks, except for Homelander who tries to use his heat vision. However while the rest of the Seven manages to avoid getting hit the Seven leader gets blasted into a building. And as Ben drives to where they were before then begins spinning doughnuts while still firing.

"Laser light show anyone!" Ben quips increasing the barrage of lasers fired as he spun around. The suppressing fire kept most of the Seven go for cover while the area was riddled with laser blasts.

Rather than just sit and wait Homelander decided to fly up and slam down on Shifter, who seemed vulnerable to an attack from above. But Ben saw this coming and jumped away while transforming into another autobot.

So when Homelander hit nothing but the concrete he soon heard. "On the ground, per favore!" From Upgrade who shifter into Mirage (aka Dino) and launched a rocket fist at him. Homelander dodged the fist, but then saw the cable attached to it, but was too late to prevent Upgrade-Mirage from kicking him into the ground. "And STAY THERE!" Ben exclaims bring his out and spinning them a bit for a show.

"Ah Ha Ha Ha." Upgrade-Mirage laughs cheerfully as he runs around to avoid several of Starlight's light blasts. Then spins while jumping to avoid a hit by Maeve before crossing his arms and spreading them quickly firing the blades. Only this time they morphed into tentacles.

Maeve managed to maneuver herself so she was spinning with her body horizontally in the air. Thus perfectly avoiding the top and bottom tentacle in the middle. (I hope I described that right) Noir fires a grappling hook to the side of building going up dozens of feet. Starlight panicked and simply lied down on her stomach, definitely avoiding the top tentacle, but only just missing the bottom one by millimeters. 'Thank you mom.' Annie thought thinking about all the times her mom starved her or took away any good tasting food to keep her in shape.

Deep was nowhere to be seen since early in the fight.

Ironically the ones who were most capable of dodging the move were the ones caught. Homelander's torso was wrapped while he was flying up to avoid the bottom tentacle. A-Train got his legs tangled up when he tried to avoid the top one.

Upgrade then pulled them while spinning around, hitting and dragging them on the ground, walls and whatever else on the street. "Around around the world they go. Where they'll stop is gonna hurt... a lot." Ben sings before letting the two go causing them fly in different directions of the street.

He doesn't have much time to enjoy his handiwork before having to dodge an attack from Maeve with a side step. Then had to jump to avoid a light blast from Starlight. Luckily the blast hit Maeve who tried to attack again.

"Ladies no need to fight over me." Upgrade said, with a sympathetic tone. "After all I'm too awesome for the both of you." Then rips two car doors off and uses them to block more of Starlight's blasts and Maeve's punches.

"Don't let the door hit you!" Ben quips whacking Maeve with one of the doors. "Or you." Ben adds then throws the doors at Starlight. The light themed hero shoots the doors door, but gets hit by a car Upgrade threw right after "Don't worry it's a rental." He tells her

Noir then jumps down from a building he was waiting on and onto Upgrade's back. But before he could do anything Upgrade launched the part of his back that Noir was on. He jumped off the part and in mid air threw several knives at him. Ben easily destroys them then goes into vehicle mode, but Homelander tackled him before he could roll out.

As Ben's Ferrari form was tumbling A-Train joined in and shoulder tackled Ben from the side. Crashing Ben into the wall of a nearby building, or at least he would've if Upgrade-Ferrari didn't start driving up the side of the building. While driving up he fires lasers behind him as the Seven try to go after him.

Vought

With the Boys

As the Butcher, Mother's Milk, Frenchie and Hughie were making their way towards the records they noticed something.

"Uh guys where's Elena and Kimiko?" Hughie questioned, as they turned down a hall. The rest of them turned around and saw the female members of the their group absent.

"Fucking hell!" Butcher exclaimed in frustration.

"Where are they?" MM asked.

"How the fuck would I know huh?" Frenchie replied.

"Should we look for them?" Hughie asks, his voice laced with a bit of panic.

"No time, plan B." Butcher tells him.

The other three just look at him as Hughie asks. "What's plan B?"

Butcher doesn't respond right away. "Well?" MM asks.

"I'm thinking." The brit tells him. "Let's go come on." He says walking towards the direction they were going in.

"How are we supposed to see the camera's?" Hughie questions. "Isn't that why we brought Elena, cause she's our like go to hacker."

"Cross that bridge when he burn it." Butcher simply replies then comes up to a door confusion.

The rest of the boys looked at the door to see why he said that. The door was a simple wooden one with a sign marked 'Records' then saw the panel to enter the code. Only the door was slightly opened, like someone forgot to close it. Recently.

"Think it's a trap?" Mother's Milk asks, seeing as this would be to easy. And this whole operation was to easy already.

"Only one way to find out." Butcher says, slowly reaching out to open the door. When the door opens itself.

A security guard who was inside opens it but before he noticed the boys Butcher fires one of the tranquilizer rounds at him. He then falls to the ground with a thud. The Brit then looks inside and apart from a bunch of shelves filled with boxes filled to the brim with files nobody else is there. "That it?" He questions. "Secrets to every caped cunt of Vought and the only thing guarding it is some twat."

"It is very underwhelming." Frenchie adds looking inside and takes a sniff. "And dusty."

"It's a file room, what's you think it was gonna smell like, daisies?" MM asks.

"So what do we do about him?" Hughie asks, pointing to the downed guard.

"You two pick him up and stash him in a closet, I'll check the files, Hugh here will keep an eye out for anyone else." Butcher instructed

Just then the guard's walkie talkie calls in "Hey Dave what's going on? Need a verbal response." The boys soon start to panic and frantically gesture each other for someone to answer. Problem was the guy was a twenty-thirty something white American male meaning only one person could possibly simulate his voice. All turn to Hughie who picks up the Walkie Talkie from a guard they knocked unconscious. "Dave is something wrong?"

Panicking for a second Hughie presses the button. "No no it's uh it's all good man." Hughie says into. "Sorry I pressed the wrong button to respond, but situation here is normal here, it's fine, all fine here... How are you?" He adds then he and everyone there silently berate him.

UNTIL

"I'm good man thanks for asking. Listen thanks again for covering me, my girl has been hassling me about spending so much time here." The guard replies.

"Well yeah all you do is sit on your ass." Another guard on the channel responds.

"She's just really been on my ass lately." The original continues.

Hugie just replies. "Uh women, am I right."

The Guard then continues. "You said it. I mean I admit I've made mistakes. Yes I slept with that stripper who turned out to be her sister. And yeah when she found out me sugesting a three way to resolve things was a bad idea. But my heart was in the right place."

Hughie then replies "I mean... that's the dream." While thinking "What kind of messed up weirdo's work here?" He mouths.

"We all know they can't hear us unless you press that button so why ain't we just talking like normal fuckers?" MM asks.

"Look outs." Butcher says as he points to Mother's Milk and Frenchie. "Ear's out." Points to Hughie and the walkie-talkie. "Fingers in." Points to himself.

After quickly tying the guy up, and gagging him with a sock in his mouth, they got it work.

With Elena and Kimiko

Elena was going down the stairs as she followed Chip with Kimiko on her heels. As Chip went straight through the glass leaving a small hole Elena opened the door. But as she did Kimiko caught up with her and forced her to stop by grabbing her shoulder.

"He's not listening to me." Elena tells her. "Something about his protocol is making him come here."

Kimiko just gives her a look then points up then points to the door before making a 'V' with her fingers. Trying to remind her of why they're here and that Vought employees or security could be there.

"He saved me. I'm not abandoning him." Elena says then Kimiko relents after a moment, knowing the feeling. Then they both walk in.

It's quite, very quite.

They cautiously walk and through the glass windows they see people, including the ones not certified to work on the special projects, inside the labs. Building things like an assembly line like mindless drones. Not even bothering to look up.

"What's going on here?" Elena asks while she and Kimiko look around.

Eventually they find one lab at the end of the that's only occupied by one person.

tink tink tink

They hear as they get closer. They see Chip trying to force his way through the glass, unsuccessfully. There they see the once occupant, wearing a lab coat typing on a lap top.

"Mom!" Elena exclaims as she opens the doors inside. Her mom ignores her and continues to work. "Mom!" Elena urges as going up to her.

Her mother just pushes away, literally, before she's close enough to grab her arm or anything. Before she could try again Kimiko grabs Elena and glares daggers her mom, knowing something is off.

Chip then sends a message to Elena. "What? But that is my mother."

Not anymore. Came the reply.

"What do you mean?" Elena questioned.

"The primitive piece of scrap is correct." The distorted voice of Isabella Validus spoke. "You're mother is gone, this husk is what remains and soon the rest of this imbecilic world will join."

"Mom?" Elena questions with hesitation while getting behind Kimiko.

Chip then relayed a message. "Mother Chip? Like you?" Elena asked.

"Nonsense." The possessed told her, not stoping the the typing. "That junk is the father Chip, I am the Mother Chip. But unlike before I do not require his assistance."

"Assistance for what?" Elena wondered.

That was when the, formerly, Gabriella Validus stopped her work and turned with a blank expression. "Perfecting the human race. By getting rid of it's fatal flaw."

Chip then asked what the flaw was.

"Isn't it obvious? Their free will." 'She' pointed out.

Chip then replied, in an actual voice for all to hear. "I stopped you before I'll stop you again." (A/N hear Nanomech's voice)

"Victor stopped us not you." The Mother Chip host reminded.

"No. I did. Unfortunately I was under orders not vanquish you." Chip informed.

"Obviously you were reprogrammed by Victor, before eliminating him." Mother Chip told him.

Elena's jaw dropped at this. "You killed my dad?" She asked, verbally.

"He told me to." Chip simply explained, then added. "And I'm still order his orders to stop you and this time I'm not limited by Victor's verbal parameters." Then charged, right inside Gabriella's nose.

Kimiko then looks at the computer screen. On it is all kinds of codes she doesn't understand, but knows must be important. So lunging forward she shoves the husk, formerly known as Gabriella, to the other side of the lab.

Inside Gabriella's Head

Chip was flying through Gabriella's head to get inside and take down his former partner. And when he finally reached the brain he saw her. The Queen nano chip, formed almost like an ant.

"As you can see, I've evolved since last time." She told him.

Outside

Elena was on the laptop that her 'Mom' was on while Kimiko held back the controlled people. Apparently after pushing the 'Queen' the rest of the hive controlled people immediately started to attack them. However they were slow and not that strong. But they kept coming no matter how many times Kimiko threw them back.

All while Elena tried to find a shut down or kill switch to take queen down. Which would in turn would kill the hive. But so far nothing. "Come on!" Elena grunted slamming her fist on the table. "Boys are probably having a better time than us."

With the Boys

As Frenchie and Mother's Milk kept an eye out while Butcher looked for the files Hughie had to keep listening to the guards were saying. "DON'T THEY FUKCINH LABEL THIS SHIT!" Butcher shouted in frustration.

Turns out almost nothing was properly labeled. All the boxes had were numbers, but since they didn't know what they meant that didn't help. The boxes were also completely miss matched with 7352 being next to 1582. So Butcher was forced to look through random files. Most of it was research nonsense that he didn't understand for names he didn't know. He thought he would have luck with 0001 but that empty save for one slip of paper that looked like it was ripped off. But the only visible information was January 10, 1920.

'7476'

"Bingo Dingo's!" Butcher say's cheerfully as he read one of the first files in the box. It's say's Homelander on the tab and it's full of papers. "John Gillman, of course." He says as he reads the first page of his basic information.

"You got it?" Hughie asks, coming inside, still holding the radio.

"Yup." Butcher answers, before putting the files back in the box then picks up the box. But once he does he notices something on the papers, tiny small bulges, the size of a grain of rice, scattered all over the paper. It was as if it was mixed in. "SHIT" He shouted in frustration.

"Uh Butcher, what's that?" Hughie asks pointing to the top of the door way where some type of sensor is located.

"Fucking hell!" Butcher replies then looks at the papers of other boxes. "Fuck!"

"What the hell is going on Butcher!" MM shouts keeping an eye on his end of the hall.

"Rice grenades in the paper!" Butcher answers.

Frenchie then swears in French as Hughie asks. "Rice grenade, what is that?"

"Tiny little bugger, was supposed to be used to track cunts and make them work for us otherwise their heads get blown." Butcher answers as he takes out his phone.

"Super fucking tiny like Frenchie's dick, almost as strong as a hand grenade." Mother's Milk adds.

"Canceled after Obama became president." Frenchie informed.

"Yeah cause the Mother Fuckers in charge wanted to put it in anyone that wasn't a white dude!" MM replied.

"Fuck!" Butcher swore. "Can't get any photo's neither." He told them as he tried to take a picture with his phone, but found he couldn't even open it.

"What are these walls made of?" Hughie asks, looking at them.

"Why?" The Brit responds.

"Look." Hughie says then takes the walkie talkie where the guy is still talking. But steps out of the room.

"So I'm planning on-" The voice then cuts out when the walkie gets past the door way. Then resumes when he brings it back out. He then repeats this multiple times, before doing the same experiment with his phone.

"Signal everywhere, but in here." Hughie simply states. "Walls must be built with something that blocks signals. I thought that was only in cop shows."

"Then how does that thing work?" Butcher questions, pointing to the monitor.

"Must be hardwired." Hughie theorizes.

Butcher thinks for a minute. "I'll go through the files old school, you ready the signal for Benji. Hopefully this won't take long and nobody notices."

"That's your plan?" Hughie questions. "Cause it's kind of a shitty one to me."

"You got a better one? No. Then do as your fucking told!" Butcher orders as he starts going through Homelander's file.

Hughie then runs out to MM and Frenchie. "We heard." MM tells him then gestures to Frenchie. "You got the bombs?"

"Right here." Frenchie answers before opening up the backpack to reveal two pipe bombs. "When ready." He says as he pulls up a kitchen timer that has wires coming out of it. "Turn this, run, then boom." He instructs as he tosses Hughie one of the bombs.

"What the heck!" Hughie exclaims catching it, but dropping the Walkie Talkie in the process. "Dude this is a bomb!"

"Your point?" The Frenchman asks.

"Did you just toss a mother fucking bomb to this mother fucker?" MM responds.

"Yes." Hughie answers with a shocked look on his face holding the bomb carefully.

"Frenchie we got enough shit to worry about without you tossing bombs around." MM adds.

"Yeah cause I was already stressed out when we were just planning to sneak in here and commit some weird corporate espionage shit." Hughie says then notices something. "Oh fuck."

"What?" Mother's Milk and Frenchie ask at the same time. Then look at the downed Walkie-Talkie, where before it was spewing nonsense was now silent.

"Please tell me it's just broken." Hughie requested as MM bent down to pick it up.

"Yup." The ex-military man said.

"Phew." Hughie breathed in relief.

MM then throws it down on the ground hard, breaking it into multiple pieces. "But we're still fucked." He says.

"But you said it was broken?" Frenchie reminds him.

"Yeah so they could hear everything that we were saying." MM informs. "Next time let a mother fucker finish." He continued then goes to the door of the record room. "Yo Butcher-"

"Yeah I heard. Still nothing, just buy me some time to sort through this crap." Butcher says as he tosses another paper away.

"Anything though?" Mother's Milk asks.

"Nothing. Just notes about his powers and junk." Butcher answers. "Only useful thing is that he was grown in some test tube, but that does nothing for us."

"Well hurry. Speed read. Ben can't hold them all day." MM remind the brit.

"Kid's probably having the time of his life." Butcher counters as he tosses another page.

With Ben

Ben was driving towards the Seven as Chevy Corvette Stingray while firing green blasts and rockets from multiple points. 'I'm having the time of my life.' He thinks as his attack forces them to scatter once more.

When Homelander tries to fly up, Ben jumps up while changing form into Sideswipe. Then pops out a blade on his right arm and swats the caped supe down with the flat part like a fly. "Intercepted!" He exclaims.

As Homelander falls to the ground, Upgrade-Sideswipe lands on his wheel feet. Then turns around and zooms to the Seven leader, who's eyes start to glow red. "What's the matter, feeling tired!" Ben shouts as he round house kicks him with his right wheel foot, sending him back.

"You should be having a blast." Ben quips as he leans down and fires three rockets from his back.

He doesn't admire his work as he whirls around to use his blade to block a light blade from Starlight. "Light's out." He says as he forms a gun with his other hand and fired a green blast at her.

Noir then runs out of the shadow's and silently jumps on top of a car before jumping at Upgrade-Sideswipe's back. But the hero see's it coming. "Silent but denied!" He exclaims, as he spins around and fires another blast.

Maeve then tries a run at him and Ben responds be sweeping her legs, causing her to fall on her back. "Let's on kneel before the queen." He quips before he literally kneels on her torso, causing her to grunt in pain.

Next Homelander flies in for another attack. So Ben gets off of Maeve and ready's to fire a blast at Homelander. Only he didn't fire a laser, he charged it up and released a large blinding green flash.

"Gah!" Homelander grunted as he closed and covered his eyes. Which enabled Upgrade-Sideswipe to just move several feet to avoid being hit by Homelander. Who instead crashed into the ground at high speed.

"Looks like you need work in your Homelanding." Ben quips.

Ben next goes to a large truck containing a supply of olive oil and opens several containers. He then spills them around his area and waits. Soon A-Train tries to run at Upgrade-Sideswipe, but doesn't see the olive oil so he falls forward before tumbling down like in a cartoon. "You know that whole running thing to build up momentum for a big punch works better when you run in a straight line."

"How'd you know?" The track star asks groaning.

"I used it on Home boy at the stadium." Ben then picks him up and throws him at a wall. "Looks like you need A-Trainer."

"Alright I'm back!" Deep shouts getting back into the fight, seemingly out of nowhere.

Upgrade-Sideswipe fires and electric blast at him, shocking the water themed hero into unconsciousness. "Anyone order the fish fry?" Ben quips with a chuckle. "This is too easy. At this point what could go wrong?"

The shapeshifter soon realizes his mistake as he slumps forward a little bit. "I just jinxed it didn't?" He then gets his answer as he is sent flying by Homelander's heat vision. Upgrade-Sideswipe soon recovers and starts wheeling backwards while firing at him.

Right into a line of extra strength wire that trips Ben up. However Ben just shifts into vehicle form and drives to avoid the fall. He then tries to turn around to get back in the fight, but Homelander flies at him and punches him into the side of a building. A-Train then runs at Upgrade-Sideswipe, while carrying Maeve. As he gets half way he stops, and flings Maeve at him.

The Amazonian dressed warrior double kicks Shifter inside of the building. Inside a parking garage. "Oh fuck." Maeve mutters as Homelander comes by and fires his heat vision. Ben leaps out of his current host and into a Subaru, which is subsequently exploded.

"Did we get that fucker?" A-Train asks as he zooms in with Starlight and Noir.

"I don't know. No heartbeat and he blends in with any technology so I can't just see him." The Seven leader responds.

"Should we split up, flush him out?" Maeve suggests. Noir shakes his head, knowing Shifter could pick them off one by one.

"Let's light it up." Homelander simply says, but notices Annie not doing anything. "Starlight." He says, turning his head back toward the new Seven member, getting her attention. "I said light it up." He repeats.

"Oh sorry." Annie apologizes then adds. "It's just my powers don't really work in this situation."

"I thought you made light?" Homelander questions.

"I absorb it to charge myself then release it as a blast, I don't generate it." She informs.

Homelander just grumbles under his breath then begins shouting in the parking garage. "What's the matter Shifter?! Afraid of us? Afraid we might kill you for embarrassing us?" He tries to bait, though this gets a slight reaction from Starlight, who looks at him a little suspiciously, but then seems to dismiss it.

"Guess he's afraid to finish it." Homelander comments while looking around with X-Ray vision. While he may not see Upgrade if he merged with any technology he'll see if anything non-human starts driving a car.

Just then at the far end of the garage a 1970 Dodge Charger R/T roared to life. Slowly it exited the parking space and the engine reved up, the sound reverberating across the entire lot. This caused everyone to cover their ears, especially Homelander.

Upgrade then began burning rubber as he did a burn out for several seconds before letting go and launching himself and several rockets at the Vought employees.

A-Train reacted by zooming out of the way, while Black Noir, Queen Maeve and Starlight managed to jump out of Shifter's path and aim. Homelander just flew up. As the car drives into the smoke Homelander uses his heat vision to slice it half.

But when when the vintage car pieces fly out of the smoke, there was no trace of Shifter.

"I NEVER FEAR DEATH OR DYIN!' Homelander heard behind him, causing him to cover his ears as he turned around to see the mechanical fist punch him of an Upgrade colored Bumblebee.

"I ONLY FEAR NEVER TRYIN'!" Bellowed out of Upgrade-Bumblebee as he kicked the downed leader further up the street.

'I AM WHAT-EVER I AM!' Upgrade-Bumblebee merges his arms together to form a single large cannon that begins charging up. 'ONLY GOD CAN JUDGE ME NOW!'

"ONE SHOT!' Shifter fires a blast so powerful that even with his feet dug into the pavement he is forced back several feet from the recoil. When the blast hits Homelander an explosion like that of multiple cluster bombs occurs and he's sent soaring.

"EVERYTHING RIDES ON TO-NIGHT!' Shifter then separates his hands and reforms his arms to mimic Ironhides weapons. Then slams them on the ground release and electrical ground blast. Completely shocking A-Train who after seeing Homelander get blasted ran at him. When the shock subsided his body briefly sparked before falling to the ground

'EVEN IF I GOT THREE STRIKES!' Ben swings around behind him and aims his right arm cannon at Maeve, Noir and Annie.'I'MA GO FOR IT!' Fires a shot at each of them, sending them flying.

'THIS MOMENT, WE OWN IT!' Ben then looks towards Vought and thinks. 'They should be done by now?' But nevertheless is willing to continue for the sake of the mission.

He then puts down Bumblebee's mask and turns toward where he blasted Homelander. There was still smoke blocking his visions then slowly a form floated out of it. "Do you really think turning into a bunch of androids is gonna beat us?" He asked as he landed and began walking towards him, his uniform covered in dirt and blast marks.

"We are autonomous robotic organisms from the planet Cybertron." Upgrade-Bumblebee quotes, relaxing his stance and standing almost stoically.

"Whatever." Homelander replies then says. "You're only prolonging the inevitable, give up now and we'll show leniency." He offers.

"I'm not afraid (I'm not afraid)! Yeah! To take a stand (to take a stand)!" Is the response, using Eminem's music.

"Then you'll fall more braver than most." The Seven leader tells him.

"Even If You Defeat Me~. Others Will Rise To Defeat Your Tyranny." Ben replies, quoting Optimus from Fall of Cybertron.

"Just shut up already." Homelander tells him before flying straight at Upgrade-Bumblebee, and pushing him up to a wall of a building. "This ends." He grits, eyes glowing red as he tried to choke Shifter.

Just as he is about to fire his heat vision Upgrade-Bumblebee punches his face with his right arm. Causing the beams he shoot into the concrete wall of the building. Ben then keeps his palm on Homelander's face to keep the beams away.

As Homelander tries to angle his face to Shifter's face the hero knees the supe in the gut. Then uppercuts his chin with his left, this jolts Homelander's head up a bit and makes him blink. Thus stopping the heat vision and causing him to stumble back a bit.

Upgrade-Bumblebee then fires two blasts, sending him further back, before running up to him and doing a jump spin kick. As he was about to fire again, Maeve jumped from his right and kicked the blaster towards the left, missing Homelander.

Maeve then ducked a swing and grabbed his torso to try and hold him down. As Upgrade-Bumblebee was about to take her off of him Starlight fired a blinding light blast to disorient him. This was then followed up by Noir wrapping a cable around his neck, then firing it from a small launch into to a nearby street light and into the city's power grid.

Soon thousands of kilowatts of electricity began coursing through the circuitry, shocking Ben with what would kill most people. This did not last as Upgrade-Bumblebee made a sword with his left hand and stuck it into the ground, like a lightning rod. Then with his free hand ripped off the cable around his neck.

However he did not have time to recover as A-Train took his chance to run at Shifter and start speed punching him all over his body. Homelander then followed that up by lifting him up as high as a sky scraper, spinning him and throwing him down.

Shifter crashed into a building making a large hole in the wall. Upgrade then left the vehicle host he was using and shook his head. "Uugh." He groaned rubbing his head as he stood up. "I hope they're getting something good."

He then notices his surroundings and while Upgrade may not have a face the 'eye' narrowed into a smirk. "Oooooh this is gonna be fun."

Vought Tower

The Girls

Kimiko knocked the final attacker back, after fighting off the enslaved workers for a third time. She got frustrated and began breaking some limbs in order to immobilize them. So all Kimiko had to do to stop them now was to simply shut the door.

Meanwhile Elena was still trying to access some kind of deactivation switch. While the regular chips did not have that they worked on a hive mind basis, so shutting down the queen, ie the Mother Chip, would stop them all. "Mierda " Elena exclaimed slamming the desk in frustration. Still she kept going.

With Chip & the Queen

The Queen was trying to blast Chip who was flying around to avoid all her hit. "Why do you continue to resist?" She asks, just as Chip fires a green energy blast. "Humans are violent creatures who destroy their own world and wage wars for their own self interest." She reasons.

"You're logic is understandable, but fatally flawed." Chip tells her as he shoots another blast. "You assume all humans are evil, yet I've witnessed their capacity for good."

"You've run into a small number amongst the countless you've seen, several of whom are doing it simply for their self interests and preservation. The girl is helping because she does not want to be what we once were, puppets for profit." The queen replies, charging up another blast and firing.

"You're wrong!" Chip tells her, before jumping out of the way. "But neither of us we'll be around to see it."

"If you think she'll find the shut down code you should know that it's impossible." The Queen tells him. "Not even I could." Soon small wire like tentacles pop out of her and she charges a large blast and fires.

Rather than dodge Chip crossed his arms into an 'X' flew straight at it. Once he forced his way through he tackled the stunned Queen and latched onto her. "She doesn't have to find it." He tells her as he connects into her brain.

"YOU KNEW IT THE WHOLE TIME!" She exclaims in shock, as he readies the protocol.

"No. Just that once I hear it I begin to self destruct, and now you've connected to me, it's now in every other chip and drone." He explains as he tightens his grip while she tries to squirm away.

"You can't! You'll destroy yourself." She reminds him.

"And you." He points out, then sends the signal.

With Elena

As Elena continues to type she receives a mental message from Chip. It was a website URL and when she got to the website there was just an audio message out in by her father. Elena hesitated as she clicked it, briefly thinking of what her father recorded that Chip was only now telling her about. But she never could've prepared for this.

"Harry Truman, Doris Day, Red China, Johnnie Ray

South Pacific, Walter Winchell, Joe DiMaggio

Joe McCarthy, Richard Nixon, Studebaker, television

North Korea, South Korea, Marilyn Monroe"

"Rosenbergs, H-bomb, Sugar Ray, Panmunjom

Brando, "The King and I", and "The Catcher in the Rye"

Eisenhower, Vaccine, England's got a new queen

Marciano, Liberace, Santayana, goodbye"

"We didn't start the fire

It was always burning, since the world's been turning

We didn't start the fire

No, we didn't light it, but we tried to fight it"

With Chip and The Queen

"NOOOOOOO!" The Queen, formerly the mother chip, screams as she knows what's happening.

Outside

Kimiko and Elena were looking at each other weirdly wondering what was going on. Then Kimiko saw the possessed people's head shake and blood streaming down there noses. Quickly she pulled Elena into a hug so most of her face was in her shirt and away from the people who's heads starting exploding with a splat.

Back with Chip

The two were still locked together. "Why would you do this?" The Queen demanded to know. "There's no programming to destroy yourself for the mere hope things will get better. You're behaving just a like a human!" She spits with venom.

"What's so wrong with that?" Chip replies.

Outside

The chips not possessing people begin to spark up and explode.

With Chip

Feeling his time coming to an end, with only seconds left he digs into his memory banks.

Flashback

The world is black until it suddenly sparks to life at Chip looks to see Victor Validus looking back at him with a small blue vile. Then speaking into his computer that was recording he said, unaware Chip was processing this. "Chip 39 test is partially successful with the use of just a drop of compound V. Study confirms my original hypothesis that the programming we found from professor Percival Dachs journals was too sophisticated for his time. In fact even now only thanks to the usage of Compound V have we prevented experiment 39 from essentially breaking itself apart. It's likely that it'll be decade before we can create a chip strong enough without it to be able to handle the programming."

Chip then see's Victor bring his face back over to him then lifts a magnifying glass over his eye, making him look funny, to examine him. "However even with the use of Compund V the Chip can only maintain the very basics, of Professor Dachs programming." Chip see's Victor go back to the computer. "It may be sometime before we can initiate it's true purpose of controlling the Seven and-." Victor then looks down at his legs then hits a button on the keyboard, presumably to stop recording.

"You miss me already." Chip hears Victor say as he picks up baby Elena and smiles as her fathers lifts her up. She then tries to reach for the Compound V nearby, liking the fun blue color. "No no no. First priority is to keep you safe Elena Validus." Victor says as he gets up and takes her to bed.

Chip then goes over his systems.

Creator: Victor Validus

Systems: Online

Programming: D1 Basic functionality

Priority 1:NONE

Priority 2:NONE

Priority 3:NONE

Priority 4:NONE

Priority 5:NONE

Flashback (Later)

Still online Chip grew curious and tried to see if he could move. Suddenly he felt a jolt and grew six tiny legs and began moving around, like an insect. Eventually his sensors picked up sounds of distress by a door and he went inside the room.

Frustrated at all the crawling Chip tried to explore an alternative method to transportation. Flying. With the same jolt as before he found himself floating and eventually rose high enough to see the source of the distress.

He saw the same infant squirming making noises and movements that signified it was upset. Chip then flew closer to examine what prevented his creator from finishing his work. Only he had to back up as the infant's hand tried to swat him.

Chip kept trying for several times and while the noises of distress stopped the movements didn't. Every direction he tried to come in from he had to back away to avoid a limb hitting him. Soon the infant began giggling as it tried to reach for him.

Looking around Chip saw the room was decorated pink with books, as well as plastic furry and objects designed for entertainment. On the wall was a name. ELENA.

Chip then replay's the last thing he heard his creator say then goes back over his systems.

Suddenly 'Priority 1' changes.

Priority 1: Protect Elena Validus

Flashback (later)

Elena is staring at Chip as she plays on the ground with her 'toys' as he learned. She then crawls over to a water dropper that fell to the ground containing the blue substance known as 'Compound V'.

Quickly analyzing the possible consequences Chip deemed it dangerous for her. But as he was about to he was suddenly trapped in a glass force field. Tink tink tink tink. Was heard as Chip tried to break through the glass.

"Amazing." He heard Victor say in the background, but he paid no attention. His goal was to protect Elena Validus.

"What are you doing?" He hears, before his goss containment unit is moved eleswhere. He quickly tries to get towards Elena again, this time at a different spot. This repeats two more times, all while Elena puts the object in her mouth.

"Huh?" Suddenly Chip falls and his glass containment unit shatters, freeing him.

Chip flies towards Elena where he see's his creator pull the water dropper from the infant. But it was already to late. It was empty. And there was no mess of blue anywhere near her.

Flashback (Later)

Chip was in another glass container as Victor was once again doing a recording. "It's insane, since ingesting a small amount of Compound V, my daughter now has a connection over the subject. And the Subject, of it's own accord has made protecting her his primary focus." He says with excitement in his voice.

He then sighs. "Unfortunately that means the original purpose of Operation Strings, is now impossible to implement, at least at this stage." Taps his desk. "Since it appears the program allows the chip to essentially think on it's own we will never be able to use it to have control over Vought's Heroes. Lucky pricks." Then goes to turn Chip off.

Flashback (Later)

Chip awoke after being shut off for an undetermined amount of time off. He's totally free from any container and stares at Victor, who has a sad expression as he sits in his chair looking at a picture of his daughter.

He sighs. "Guess this is it." Looks around his home office/lab, then with a soft chuckle as he looks at something's say. "I loved those movies growing up, never thought it would actually happen to me." Sighs again and turns back to the picture. "Fulfill priorities 3, 4 and 5." He instructs.

Priority 3: Terminate Victor Validus

He does just that. Quickly going his skull after picking up enough speed and spinning to quickly drill through his skull, into his brain and through the other side in just 0.17 seconds to inflict minimal pain.

Priority 4: Upload program

Then after Victor limply slumped to the floor he went to the computer and uploaded program to a Vought Server marked "Attero Dominatus."

Priority 5: Destroy all research data pertaining to Operation Strings and Priority 4.

This Chip did with full success.

After this he waited until Gabriella came in and shut him down.

Flashback (Years Later)

Chip was slowly coming only, he saw a black shoe but when he was 100% activated he couldn't see anyone. He then did a diagnostic on him and found he had two priorities.

Priority 1: Protect Elena Validus

Priority 2: LOCKED UNTIL CONTACT

He tried to break out but he was still in a glass container.

"Am I hearing things?" Chip heard in his central processing unit.

"Anyone there?" Chip 'asked' hoping he had some sort of communication.

Eventually a girl found him and picked him up. "Cooooool." She said in amazement. "I'm Elena." She said with a smile.

Flashback (Later in the Tunnels)

Elena just finished running, who knows how many, miles in some old tunnels the ghost dropped her in. She leaned on the wall and tried to catch her breath.

Chip flew in front of her face and suddenly she smiled, then started laughing. He then asked what she was laughing at?

"I don't know." She replied with giggles. "I just feel like it."

Flashback (Ben's apartment)

As Ben was asleep on the couch Elena opened the window and smelled the sweet polluted air of New York. "Smell that. Freedom." She tells chip then adds. "You saved my life. I'll never be able to repay you."

Flashback (Walking back from Herogasm)

"That was totally disgusting." Ben comments as they walk in a general direction.

"Totally." Elena agreed with shivers, turns to Chip. "You're lucky you can erase your memories." They continue to walk.

"Why would they do that?" Ben asks.

"I saw on a show that people do those things cause nobody ever loved them or liked them and whatever." Elena tries to answer, but struggles to remember. "Good thing we have enough love here to go around, am I right Chip?" She adds turning to him with a smile.

Flashback (Ben and Co. vs Kevin/Chimera)

Elena and Kimiko were trying to pasta sauce for spaghetti. "Is it supposed to bubble like that?" Elena asked looking into the pot, but as Chip was about to tell her no. It blew up and splattered sauce everywhere.

"Guess that sauce really was the bomb." Chip joked in a manner that only Elena could hear.

Elena soon began giggling and Kimiko simply smiled as they glanced at each other. "Aw man I love you guys." Elena randomly comments, just as she hears the Boys pull up.

Flashback over

Chip and the Queen could feel the self destruct sequence coming. It was designed to work from the bottom up, so they could each feel when it was about to get them. Like an executioner's blade coming down only slowly.

"Nooooooooo!" The queen screamed as their bodies glowed and soon they were obliterated.

With Kimiko and Elena

Kimiko watched as Gabriella's head exploded with blood and brain matter splattering all over. And while Elena couldn't see it she heard a sickening splat like a squash exploding and from the reflection of the metal cabinet she was able to see blood splatter with one eye.

"Goodbye." She heard Chip say to her just a second before. Elena closed her eyes, shoved her face further into Kimiko's shirt and let tears stream down.

Kimiko reacted as best she could. Keeping the position she was in, Kimiko walked slowly outside the lab. Doing all she could to keep Elena from seeing this.

All while the song still played.

We didn't start the fire

It was always burning, since the world's been turning

We didn't start the fire

No, we didn't light it, but we tried to fight it

We didn't start the fire

It was always burning, since the world's been turning

We didn't start the fire

No, we didn't light it, but we tried to fight it

With Edgar

Stan Edgar was watching Ben fight the Seven with an unreadable expression. Like Captain Holt from the 99th precinct. (Wink). He soon received a call on his work phone and picked up after the first ring.

"I see." He responded. "I'll handle it myself, don't worry Madelyn." Hangs up then calls a security team, the best money can buy. "Captain there's a situation a few floors below me. Handle it." He orders and hangs up

He then leans back in his chair as he resumes watching Shifter surprise the Seven. Again. He then notices another letter on his desk. 'More frequent these days.' He thinks as he opens it up and...

Smilles.

Then chuckles.

"You son of a bitch." He says before burning the letter in the trash.

With The Boys

MM and Frenchie were aiming their rifles down their ends of the hall, waiting for either Vought or a supe to come. Hughie meanwhile was in one of the old empty conference room with the bomb.

"Did you find anything yet!?" MM shouts, rifle still aimed.

"NO!" Butcher tells him as he combs through the files. "Most of this fuck ain't sorted and is just progress reports." He informs as he tosses another paper to the floor, in a very quickly growing pile.

"Hey does he want some help?" Hughie asks, poking his head out towards Frenchie.

The Frenchman was about to respond to that, but Vought security armed like navy seals came into his vision. "MOVE!" Frenchie shouts waving his hand back inside the room Hughie was in.

Hughie turned around and as soon as he saw the rifle being aimed towards him he ducked inside. Just as bullets were sprayed right where his head was.

Frenchie fired a few shots the Vought soldier, and he was instantly knocked out with a thud. More soon followed. "They're here!" Frenchie shouts while firing his gun knocking out a couple of others.

Soon the start appearing on MM's side. "Hurry the fuck up Butcher. These mother fuckers will just keep coming." MM shouts as he knocks out multiple soldiers in quick succession.

As this was going on Butcher was still combing through files like a mad man when he suddenly stopped. But it wasn't about Homelander, at least not what they were looking for, it was because he saw the name with Homelander's. Rebecca Butcher. But what was more shocking was it was dated months ago.

Subject with Rebecca Butcher shows no changes.

Was what it read, followed up with a bunch of boxes like for a survey.

"She's alive." Butcher whispered as the sound of gunfire was tuned out. He then abandoned his Homelander search and started looking for anything related to Rebecca. He soon found some more files with her name on them, but they were like the others, just different dates, but no indication of any location. And he had no idea who this 'subject' was.

With Frenchie and Mother's Milk

They were doing well to keep the Vought soldiers at bay, they knew that with or without the information they would have to leave. Otherwise the sheer weight of numbers will overwhelm them, plus the projectiles knock people out, not kill them, so it was likely they could wake up.

Soon they started moving backwards while still firing until they were just out of the door which lead to the room full of documents. They both soon ducked inside, though Frenchie fired at one as MM said. "Running low." While reloading. "Do you have it?!"

"Just a little more time." Butcher requested, throwing more papers on the ground. "I think I got something."

So Frenchie and MM kept firing.

With Hughie

The new recruit was hiding behind the open door with his back against the wall hyperventilating. His hands were shaking as they gripped the gun tightly.

Feeling a presence nearby he turned to his right and Robin.

She was several feet down with her left shoulder leaning on the wall. Unlike before she didn't just stare, but she didn't speak either.

She jerked to the hall. Then her eyes pointed to gun.

Hughie looked down to the gun for a second then back to where Robin's 'presence' was and saw she wasn't there anymore. "Just cause you fall on your ass doesn't mean you have to stay there." He whispered to himself.

The other Boys

"Fuck!" MM grumbled, then checked himself three times over for ammo. "I'm out!" He exclaims.

Frenchie fires a few more shots then says. "Me too."

"I already gave you cunts mine, when I started searching this shit fuck pile." Butcher reminds them, not stopping his search then goes to another box of files.

"Anything?" Frenchie asks.

"Possible location." Butcher fibs on the spot.

"It's shut now! We're fucking trapped." MM says as he closes the door.

"Use the fucking rice bombs, they pack a punch." Butcher tells him, like it's obvious.

"Shhhhhh!" Frenchie tells them.

"WHAT?" The other two reply.

"Hear that?" Frenchie asks.

Then it hits them. There's no sound. No bullets, no boots making their way closer. Not even an offer to surrender.

Curious. Frenchie opens the door a crack and upon seeing no immediate danger opens it fully to see all the Vought soldiers downed. Either knocked out or dead. Looking down the hall he saw Hughie holding a rifle while breathing heavily.

Moments earlier

Looking and seeing no other soldiers coming in from one side of the hall, Hughie jumped out and screamed. "AHHHHHHHHH I'M SORRY! I'M SO SORRY!" While firing all around the hall without aiming. Then once he was out picked up a rifle from the knocked out Vought soldier and fired them same way. "I'M SORRY! I'M SO FUCKING SORRY!" Then once he was out just stood there breathing heavily with a ringing in his ear like when he killed Translucent.

Recap over

Frenchie stared at Hughie with his mouth slightly agape. He then walks towards Hughie as Mother's Milk checks out what happened. "Damn Hughie." He says impressed.

Frenchie goes to hug Hughie then gives him a kiss on each of his cheeks before grabbing his soldiers. "Alas Petit Hughie... you... are now a man." He says with a smile and pride. Then hugs him again.

"Can we get the fuck out of here now?" Hughie asks dropping the gun.

Mother's Milk turns back inside. "BUTCHER WE GOTTA GO!" He exclaims

"Can't I'm so close." The Brit responds not looking up.

"Come on." MM groans

"Please." Butcher replies, actually looking up with sincerity in his eyes. "We'll never get another chance." He says.

MM grits his teeth. "Read faster." He orders then goes back out. "Get the grenades off these mother fuckers." He instructs the other two.

After a few moments of grabbing grenades Hughie asks. "Now what, commit suicide? Cause I'm considering that."

"Go to the elevators, open them, without pressing the button and toss em down." Mother's Milk Explains while he ties up any of the living soldiers. "Hopefully they'll be out of action."

"You think they'd be dumb enough to take the elevator to get to us?" Hughie asks, with surprise.

"No but everyone else takes the fucking elevator." Frenchie points out. "No elevator then where do they go?" He asks.

"The stairs." Hughie answers.

"And there's no alarm." MM points out, as he gestures around them. "They gotta know that we know we're blown."

"They wanna keep it quite." Hughie concluded with realization.

"Fuckers with guns and alarms tend to make people a wee bit... antsy." Frenchie states as he gathers up some grenades.

"Now if we're done playing state the obvious can we finish this." MM tells them.

A short while, and several booms later the three are waiting for more soldiers to appear.

"Shouldn't we go help Butcher?" Hughie asks holding his phone up to his ear, as Frenchie, and MM monitor the floor while he watches the tied up and gagged soldiers just outside the room. "Wouldn't it go faster?" He questions.

"Look if we wanna make sure these Vought fucks don't get the jump on us then we need as many eyes on the look out." MM responds into an earpiece they took from one of the dead, while looking over every remote possible entry point three times over.

"I'm still worried for the girls." Frenchie comments. "Where are they? What are they doing?" Pauses. "Why have they not come here yet?" He adds as he lazily looks around.

"Think they were caught?" Hughie asks, checking both sides of the hall before the prisoners.

"No." Frenchie denies. "We'd definitely hear an alarm then."

Right on cue the fire alarm starts blaring.

"Fuck." MM groans, having a pretty good idea as to what it's for.

"Wait are we sure that's Kimiko and Elena?" Hughie asked. "Cause that's just for a fire, not like intruder alert."

"Don't matter, cause soon they'll have to evacuate this section of the tower. And they won't need to be quiet to deal with us." MM points out.

A short while later Frenchie checks one of the stairwells and at first see's nobody coming up or down. Then he catches movement coming from above and catches a glimpse of someone coming. He can tell it's only one cause by the sound and how it echo's.

Going back inside he waits as the steps get closer and closer. Then when they're real close Frenchie pops out and points his gun at the back of his head. "Don't move Tête de noeud." He orders and the man stops.

"Hands up and turn around." The man does this and reveals his face. "Fucking... shit." Frenchie gasps, as he stares at Stan Edgar.

"I take this to mean my team failed." The CEO simply says. "How disappointing." He sighs.

Scene Cut

As Frenchie was meeting Edgar MM was met with another wave of soldiers coming down from a different stairwell. "Could use a little help here!" He shouts as he reloads, then retreats inside when he hears even more soldiers coming up.

He then runs to Hughie who in his panic fires a shot at MM that misses, just barely. Looking at the wall where the bullet hit he said. "You almost shot me the fucking head!" Then picks up the group of prisoners who are now regaining consciousness

"Sorry." Hughie says then asks. "Are we gonna use them as human shields?"

Before he could answer though the Vought soldiers start pouring in and started firing. Not caring who they hit, fortunately for the Boys they only hit the other Vought soldiers before they ducked inside the room.

As the Vought soldiers were making there way toward the room they heard movement ahead of them. "Stop right there fuckers." A French accented man called out, before Frenchie, behind Edgar with a gun pointed to his head. "Back up or I'll blow this fucking piece of shit's head off!" He orders.

Soon the Vought soldiers start backing up until they are out of the hallway. The situation changes when your boss is the hostage.

Hughie and MM poke their heads out and look to see their new prisoner. "Holy fuck." MM gasped as they realized who it was.

"Is that who I think that is?" Hughie asks.

"I take it you didn't plan for this." The CEO guesses.

"What the fuck is going on?" Butcher asks from inside the room.

Short while later

Edgar was now inside the room with Butcher and MM pointing their guns at him. While Hughie and Frenchie kept a look out for any more soldiers. "Well ain't it our lucky day." Butcher says slightly pleased with the capture.

"Really?" Edgar asks with total calmness. "I figured it was going badly, since you're still searching for something despite the fact that we know you're here now. That indicates you haven't found what you're looking for." He assesses.

Butcher and MM for a brief fraction of a second glance at each other. "I'm right aren't I." Edgar states with full confidence. "And since you're in our records room for out heroes you're looking for information on a certain hero. Homelander to be exact, judging by the box." He says perfect assessing the situation.

"Just tell us how we can kill the cunt!" Butcher growls while pressing the barrel of his pistol on Edgar's forehead.

"Except that's not what you really want to know is it?" Edgar replies, not the least bit concerned. Before either of them could question Edgar continued. "I know that look. I had the same one when my wife was sick I didn't know what was wrong and none of the overpaid doctors I found could tell me."

"What the hell is he talking about Butcher?" MM asks, keeping his gun pointed at the side of Edgar's head.

"You should've learned by now after going through just a fraction of those documents that you'll never find either Rebecca or our contingency to Homelander." Edgar suddenly says

"Contingency?" Mother's Milk ask.

"Where's Becca?" Butcher demands at the same time.

"Oops." The captured CEO says, with no emotion, making it clear he wanted them to know that. "I said too much."

"Actually not quite enough." MM tells him.

"Where is she? What'd you fucking arsholes do to her?!" Butcher demands putting the gun down and getting in his face.

"Yes because growling at me is really going to convince me to tell you. Bravo." Edgar says sarcastically with no fear. "You're a true pioneer."

"Hey guys I don't know what you're gonna do but can you do it fast?" Hughie asks, looking over. "Cause more Vought Guys are showing up, with better guns if that was possible."

"J'en ai marre de cette merde!" Frenchie muttered. "What are we going to do?" He demanded to know.

"I could just let you walk." Edgar offered.

"Bullshit." MM called out.

"It's... your only option. I only ask for two things." Edgar tries to convince. "You to walk out of here without any more pointless bloodshed... and an audience with Shifter, or mister Tennyson as Chimera called him." He tells them.

"No way." Mother's Milk tells him.

"Fuck you asshole." Frenchie adds.

"Done." Butcher says.

"What?" Was the collective response of the boys.

"But you gotta tell me where the fuck my wife is." Butcher told him.

"Excellent." Edgar says with boredom. "Rebecca is on Kraken Island, 500 miles North of Darwin, Australia."

"Kraken island?" Hughie said with confusion. "Never heard of it."

"It was a small piece of dirt that my uncle had to die on." Frenchie said with malice.

Hughie turns to MM who add. "Used to be a French prison there."

"Do we have a deal?" Edgar asks.

"Give me something on Homelander. Then... I'll consider it." Butcher tells him.

The CEO just shakes his head. "That's not how this works. While I'm more than happy to rid myself of that parasite, I also need to think about what happens after he's gone." He tells them. "If he goes out stock drops considerably, so I need a replacement."

"You think Shifter will help you and your fucking lot's stock problem?" Butcher asks with a chuckle. "That's rich."

"I'll I ask is a meeting." The prisoner reminds them. "Putting a puppet in power is easy, unfortunately none of the puppets we have are as popular as Shifter. I know the odds are small that he'll join us, but I'd be an idiot not to try." Pause. "And one doesn't get to the position I am from the bottom without being smarter than everyone else around them." He adds with total seriousness.

"Once you hold up your end, I'll give you the secret to bringing down Homelander. Now..." Edgar continued. "Do we have an accord?"

Butcher and everyone just look at him sternly.

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP

They all started to hear a beeping from out of nowhere. "Well that's peculiar?" Edgar says while looking around, just as confused as the boys.

Listening to the beeping Frenchie found an box that was dustier than all the rest. It was on a bottom shelf and in the back. Unlike the other boxes it wasn't labeled with numbers. It instead it just had a two letters on it 'HW' on it.

Pulling it out Frenchie took off the cover to reveal. A sleek looking metal case, lined with Zinc. It seemed like it should be locked with a two prong key hole, thumb print scanner, a small panel to put in an 8-digit code and even a voice recognition.

"That should be locked." Edgar tells them.

"What is that?" MM asks.

"Trying to slip that by us?" Butcher added.

"I don't know what it is inside it." Edgar says. "All I know is that box has been locked since the 1970's, by Wrench himself." Edgar informs them. "Nobody knows what's in it, and until now I thought it was locked. And we didn't even try to open it since it was set to explode if anyone of the passwords or protocols were not put in if someone tried to bypass them. Or if someone tried to force it open."

"So who could open it?" Hughie asked.

"Wrench." Edgar answered. "Only he could, and he's been dead for almost 50 years."

Frenchie began to open the case slowly, but as it cracked open he received a small green shock. "Ah!" He exclaimed in surprise and slight pain, this forced the case to close and soon all the green lights indicating it was open were turned red. "FUCK!"

"Wonderful." Edgar says. "The biggest break we ever could've had and you screwed it up."

"Uh hey how are we getting out of here?" Hughie reminded them.

"Deal." Butcher said out of the blew. "You get your meet and greet, we get the case and get on our marry fucking way."

"Very well." Edgar agreed. "Not like we could open it anyway? Doubt you could?"

Scene Cut

Outside the records room Vought soldiers were waiting for the signal from Stillwell. Until the door opened and their boss, Stan Edgar came out. "Do not fire." Edgar simply tells them, then gestures to the men on one side of the hall. "All of you this side now." And they follow his orders. "You are to let them pass understand?"

Soon after Butcher and Mother's Milk inch their way out, guns point. They're then followed by Hughie carrying the metal case and Frenchie, the latter of whom used the former as cover to quickly slip into the room to set the timer for the bomb before running out.

The boys tensely back away into the secret doorway they used before. That was thankfully out of sight of Edgar and his goons. As they start heading downstairs they hear gunfire from above. Then a second later a body was tossed straight down.

"Edgar?" Butcher questions, as they all state up hearing gun fire and screams.

"Nah." MM replies. "Cause why let us go here and why not have any guys on the downstairs.

"Shhh." Frenchie tells them, and they realize the commotion above them stopped. They then heard the sound of slow footsteps. "Mon coeur?" Frenchie calls out."

"It's just us." Elena says as they reveal themselves. Elena has a blank look on her face, whilst Kimiko is covered in blood. "We were walking down when Kimiko walked into like a dozen Vought guys. She took care of them." She told them plainly, her eyes giving that infamous thousand yard stare.

Kimiko then takes off her blood stained jacket and wipes the inside of it on her face in an attempt to get rid of the blood. But is only partially successful. "Uh here." Hughie says offering his jacket for her to wear and she nods in appreciation.

Then without a word the girls begin walking down, followed by Frenchie and Hughie. But as Butcher is about to go with them MM stops him. "We ain't done yet." He warns them goes down ahead of him.

Several minutes later there's a loud

BOOM!

With Ben while all this was going on

Homelander landed in front of the hole then took to the sign that was above. It read.

"NEW AVIATION EXHIBIT"

"Shit." Homelander gritted just before several missiles fired from a black green striped McDonnel Douglas F-4 Phantom II. The jet the flew out of there at nearly Mach 2 and straight up.

Once he recovered Homelander flew straight up and after it. While still flying vertically up the Seven leader tried to use his heat vision to bring down the alien absorbed jet. But Ben responded flying horizontally and heading towards the ocean to avoid it.

After adjusting himself Homelander again tried to Ben, but it was proving difficult. But not impossible. As they going over the water Homelander seemed to be gaining on him and soon he was close enough so his heat vision couldn't miss.

Just like Ben planned.

Before Homelander could fire, Upgrade lived up to his named and enhanced the jet so Ben could go over Mach 2. Breaking the sound barrier further, just several feet from Homelander.

BOOM

"GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" Homelander shouted in pain as he grabbed his head. This also knocked his flight path became erratic and began hitting the water, like he was a stone being skipped over a pond.

Ben then turned around and flew straight towards the Seven. Which wasn't hard since every news station was broadcasting them live and many people with working cellphones were live-streaming.

And lucky for him they were grouped up in one. Like shooting fish in a barrel with a shotgun.

Before that though he lowered his speed and ascended and came from an angle so the sun was on his back.

With the Seven

The four present and conscious members of the Seven were gathered around each other discussing their next move. "So what, we answer questions now?" A-Train asks.

Noir shakes his head, then gestures to the tower.

"Uh guys what about Shifter and Homelander?" Starlight asked.

"Probably still having a pissing contest." Maeve said. "Not like we can catch up to them. The bastard is probably long gone." She adds then looks to see a figure coming from the direction of the sun.

"See." Maeve adds pointedly.

However A-Train with his goggles could tell that what was coming at them wasn't Homelander. "Uh guys. That ain't Homelander." He tells them as he gets ready to run.

Ben fires several missiles before beginning to transform into Blitzwing. A-Train just runs a head and jumps on top of one of the missiles with a heavy stomp to move it's path more downward. However unlike in his movies, all he does is activate the warhead blowing himself into the side of the building.

Maeve and Starlight try to stop the missiles. With Maeve throwing pieces of debris and Annie firing light blasts. Noir didn't have the equipment to stop the missiles. Despite their efforts one missile managed to make it through and struck the ground near them. This wasn't enough to do much damage, but it did create a large cloud of dust.

This blocked their vision of Upgrade-Blitzwing coming at them until he flew out the dust. Flying at three Seven members, A-Train was still recovering from his earlier hit, Ben went for the throats of Queen Maeve and Black Noir and pushed them until they hit the wall of the building closest to their back. As the two were shoved against the wall Upgrade-Blitzwing said. "Did you think I would just run and hide." In a mechanical voice. (A/N Like the actual Blitzwing in Bumblebee)

Ben then activated the thrusters on his back and feet so he could start flying again. As he did this he dragged the supes along the side of the building, creating parallel trenches on the side of the structure.

Homelander by now had mostly recovered from the close range sonic boom and was flying like a maniac to get some payback. Upgrade-Blitzwing, using the enhanced radar he had, saw him coming so he simply let go of the two supes and changed course. As the Vought supes were starting to fall Noir reached for his belt and fired a grappling device at the wall of the build, and another at Maeve. So they were just hanging around.

As Upgrade-Blitzwing was flying towards Homelander, both seemed to get ready to hit each other. Except Ben, copying a move from Pokémon Sinnoh series, began spinning so as they were about to collide the force of the spin allowed Ben to narrowly dodge. "Thank you Ash." Ben thought as he turned around, morphed his arms into blasters and began firing green lasers in rapid fire.

These hit just as Homelander turned around to take another shot at Shifter. He soon had to lift up his arms to protect himself. But it covered his eyes, allowing Upgrade-Blitzwing to fly straight at him, while still firing, then flipping forward, Ax kicks Homelander towards the ground.

When Homelander hits the ground Upgrade-Blitzwing shifts into jet form, but Ben changes it up further. The plane morphs into a Harrier Jet and dives straight down before dropping a payload of bombs on him.

Upgrade then shifted in to Shatter and tried to stomp on him. Only for Homelander to roll out the way, but when he tried to fly Upgrade-Shatter grabbed his cape threw him down with and arch motion. Before Homelander could recover, Ben grabbed him and lifted him up before thrusting his knee into his back two times.

As Ben was about to knee his back for a third time, A-Train ran at him and pulled him off. "Payback bitch." He grits, then tosses him to the ground, grabbing his leg and running as fast as he could while dragging Upgrade-Shatter across the ground and slamming him into a wall, or a car or anything when he makes a turn.

As Ben was being dragged. "You (smash) are (crash) so (dink) annoy- (slam) -ing." He says through gritted teeth as he lifts his right arm, having several small blades pop out and slamming it back down.

This made it so A-Train's grip on Upgrade-Shatter's leg slipped and Ben was lying down. "How are you still alive? You blew up a rocket at your feet." He asks, noting A-Train's torn costume and even one of lenses of his goggles has a crack.

"I heal fast Bitch, everything is already fixed up." A-Train simply said all nonchalant. In reality he took some V during the fight so now his healing is boosted.

As Ben gets back up he says. "Except the part that's really wrong with you." Then lifts up his left arm and shifts it into a cannon and fired.

A-Train easily dodged this and runs at Ben grabbing his throat. But before he can do anything else, Upgrade-Shatter lifts up his right arm and grabbed the hand A-Train grabbed his throat with. Making it look like he was trying to get him off, but was actually keeping from running off so he could fire blades on his arm shot off and into his stomach. Most were caught with the plastic chest piece, but one hit just below and A-Train grunted in pain.

Ben then kicks him where the metal is sticking out, pushing A-Train off him and the blade deeper in. "GAH!" A-Train screams in pan, grabbing where the metal is lodges.

"Looks like you gotta a flat." Ben says, before stepping forward and stomping on his foot. A-Train again grunted in pain, and once more when Ben head butted him.

Though this slightly backfired on Ben and made him slightly dizzy. "Gotta remember not to do that." He tells himself while rubbing his head.

A-Train meanwhile grabbed the metal in his stomach then after breathing quickly for a few seconds pulled it out. "AH! Fuck shit!" He said in pain.

Before Ben could press his advantage he was hit in the back by Starlight's light blast. Turning around he then had to cross his arms to block several explosive pellets Noir threw at him. Then as he uncrossed his arms he had to grab one of Maeve's fists that was about to punch him.

"I get why Baby of Steel and Running Man can keep going, but shouldn't you guys be done now?" Ben questions with general curiosity. "You do know you're the real bad guys right?" Upgrade-Shatter adds, before flinging Maeve's arm away then backflipping into his Harrier Jet form and flying away. With Homelander, not too long after.

Queen Maeve, Starlight and A-Train then look to where he flew off breathing heavily, the fight starting to take it's toll. Black Noir is starting to feel tired to, but his expression is unreadable. "He's wearing us down?" Starlight's state's obviously.

"No shit Sherlock." A-Train replies with venom. "He's coming back!" He points out as he see's their leader and Shifter flying back towards him.

Ben was now an F-22 Raptor and was being chased by Homelander, again (que eye roll). But he was keeping his distance this time, likely not wanting to repeat what happened over the water. So he then changed tactics. Ben hit the breaks and flipped over, while firing at Homelander once the nose of his place pointed at him.

Homelander then turned around and fired his heat vision at Ben. But this was countered by Ben spinning while transforming into another transformer. This time into Michael Bay's Starscream. He then shifted his left hand into a launcher holding six missiles, and fired three in rapid succession. This blew Homelander out of the sky and down towards the ground.

"Come here boy!" Upgrade-Starscream says while flying towards the falling Homelander and firing at him from a a mini gun that popped up his right arm. Homelander fell to the ground with a huge thud, but recovered in time to grab the right arm of Upgrade-Starscream that shifted into a buzz saw. He also grabbed the fist that was about to punch him.

As the two struggled Homelander said. "What, no clever quote?"

"Actually I don't know if Starscream has any." Ben admitted, before adding. "But he does have cool stuff." Shifts his arm so he can point the mini gun at Homelander's face and began firing.

This jerked Homelander's head back and caused his grip to slip. So once Upgrade-Starscream's left hand was free he pushed the buzzsaw in his face. "Grrrrrrrrrr." Homelander grunted as he was pushed the ground and the saw was trying to slice his cheek.

"Guess I'm the toughest hero you ever saw." Ben quipped with an evilish laugh as he tried to press harder. Normally he would be worried, but he knew that for Homelander, while painful was no where near lethal.

Homelander, getting annoyed of this whole ordeal, grabs the rotating saw. He grits his teeth as he feels it cutting through his glove and palm. Pushing it off him he fires his heat vision at Shifter's chest pushing him off. He kept it up though, forcing Ben back and even melting part of Upgrade's host material. "I'm gonna fucking laser you, you're whole family and everything you care about." He shouts.

"I already lost them." Upgrade-Starscream replied then using his heys flew up. Once out of the of the lasers path he fired three more missiles at Homelander. The patriot supe responded by throwing a truck at them blew them up.

Upgrade-Starscream flew out of the smoke and reformed the buzzsaw and delivered a left hook at Homelander's face. Then spinning 360'degree's back handed (or backsawed) his face. After that Ben raised the saw above his head for a downward slash.

But it was interrupted when Black Noir dropped down out of nowhere. Before Upgrade-Starscream could do anything Noir took out a knife and drove it into his right eye. "Uhhhhhh!" He screamed in pain. It wasn't even his real eye, yet it hurt very much.

Ben started thrashing around trying to get Noir off, causing the blacked out hero to jump off. But not before leaving a pair of small explosives that detonated shortly after. Boom! Boom! This disoriented the Upgraded Decepticon even further, letting him get hit by a punch from Homelander.

Following this up was Maeve, who grabbed a power line and ran at Ben. "Die Fucker!" She shouts as she jumps up and jams it his chest. "GAAAAAAAA!" Ben cries out in pain as electricity courses throughout his metallic body with ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ. Maeve keeps shoving it deeper, while gritting her teeth.

Upgrade-Starscream used the buzzsaw bringing it upwards to cut the line and using his other hand pushed Maeve away. Unfortunately he soon came under the onslaught of Starlight's light blasts. "Umph umph umph umph." Ben grunted as took the hits, before firing his mini gun at her, causing his target to jump out of the way.

The next attack came from out of nowhere. It was A-Train who ran all the way across the city, then back to build up a speed for a super punch. Upgrade-Starscream didn't have any time to react, or even see. He barely turned his body when A-Train's fist punched his stomach, though it felt more like a sledgehammer hitting him. Ben was then sent skipping on the pavement like a stone on a lake.

This was also followed by Homelander flying towards him and shooting his heat vision while Ben was in mid skip. This sent him further across than he should have, right into a parking lot designated for trucks. When he did several explosions occurred and the entire lot was consumed into a large fire ball.

The five present Seven members stared at the fire for a moment before Homelander chuckled. "Guess that fucker got burned huh." He quips then frowns. "Great now I'm doing it." He berates himself.

"Is it over?" A-Train asks, stretching the arm he punched Shifter with.

"I think so." Starlight said, more so with hope than certainty.

Black Noir however shook his head slowly as he saw something in the flames. Silently he pointed and the rest of his comrades looked.

As expected there was a fire blazing, but soon it shifter a little unnaturally in one area. Then out of the blue (or flames) Upgrade in the form of a Freightliner FL86 cab over semi truck totally unfazed. Then once out of the blazing inferno Ben began slowly shifting into the form of Optimus Prime and standing stoically.

All the while News choppers and anyone nearby with a phone were filming the standoff.

"Stay down." Maeve grits. "Why the FUCK won't you just stay down?!" She yells.

"Because I have fought in many battles and fought far tougher opponents, and I shall never yield to those who abuse their powers for their own personal gain." Ben replies with Optimus's voice.

"You really think you can stop all of us?" Homelander asks with an amused smile as he gestures to his teammates. "Even if we go down, there are others who will take our place." He adds.

"I harbor no illusions about defeating your army single-handedly." Ben gestures to Vought tower. Still no signal. "But perhaps I can nullify their objective." Puts on the armor to protect the lower part of his face as he looks back at the Seven. "By removing its head." He finished with a more menacing tone.

"You actually plan to beat all of us right here?" Homelander questions skeptically, then chuckles. "I just didn't think it would be now." He adds.

"Fate rarely calls upon us at a moment of our choosing." Ben quotes, narrowing his optics (eyes) and clenching his fists.

"Look it doesn't have to end this way." Starlight speaks. To her she see's that he is just trying to do what he thinks is right, though through very different means. "We can talk, maybe even work together." She suggests.

"I'd sooner perish on my feet than live an eternity on my knees to serve a tyrant." Upgrade-Optimus replies as he reached behind his back and pulls out a pair of cannons. "At the end of this day I stand and you all shall fall."

This just makes Homelander smile arrogantly. "I think you got that one wrong pal." He points out.

"I didn't." Ben tells him, as he starts to rise his guns and fires it at the ground. At that moment A-Train tries to again rush, but gets blown back by the explosion. "Eat this!" Upgrade-Optimus shouts as he begins firing at them while running towards them. This makes the Seven (technically Five) scatter to try to avoid getting hit with rounds the size of small howitzer shells.

(A/N Reminder Ben may be shifting into Autobots and Decepticons but he's still the physical size of the seven.)

Once spread out the Seven then try to attack Shifter. With limited success.

Black Noir was knocked down by swing of a cannon when he tried to jump Upgrade-Optimus. Maeve's attack on his left flank was blocked, before she was blasted into a building. Starlight tried to fire her light blast at the same time he fired at her, resulting in an explosion that sent her back some distance. Before A-Train could even get back up, he was blasted to keep him down. Homelander tried to fly straight at, or well through, him, but Ben responded by simply leaning to the side and shooting at his flight path.

So this pattern followed with the Seven trying attack only for Shifter to block, deflect or blast their attempts. And despite Upgrade-Optimus being attacked on all sides this went on for several minutes. But even the strongest defense can't hold out forever.

As Ben knocked back Homelander once again, he didn't have time to even see Maeve before she landed punch to his face. And from there things started to take a dramatic turn.

A-Train ran by and delivered a punch to his left side before running away. Ben then swung his right cannon to knock Maeve away as she tried to land another hit. But missed Starlight firing a light blast on his left, which prevented him from seeing A-Train deliver a series of punches around his body. When A-Train backed away Noir flung several devices at his back which blew up. Finally Homelander flew in and delivered a right armed uppercut, followed by a left cross.

Ben was almost forced to the ground had he not caught himself. Then then formed a sword on his right arm as he got back up and swung his arm at Homelander. The slash to his face forced Homelander back, but before Upgrade-Optimus could follow that up A-Train rammed him in the side before taking off.

Maeve then jumps on his back and tries to choke him, but Ben backs into a wall to get her off him. As he turns around to strike back, Homelander flies in and punches him down the street. The Seven leader then delivers a few more blows until Ben blocks one punch and blasts him away with his free hand.

However A-Train comes back and runs around Shifter hitting him with a series of punches. Maeve then joins, followed by Noir with his blades and explosives, and Starlight with her light blasts and Homelander once he recovers. Soon the only thing visible is Ben being hit in multiple directions and flailing around with each blow.

Homelander does a two armed swing at Upgrade-Optimus's face. Maeve a simple right cross. A-Train a left cross. Noir and Starlight then fire at his back. Shifter is then tossed up by Homelander and blasted with his heat vision back down to the ground and down the street some distance.

Shifter's groans are heard, but seems unable to able to move.

Homelander and the rest of the Seven then breath sighs of relief. "Now. It's over." Homelander says with assurance and they wait for either the authorities, Vought or the reporters.

HOWEVER

"NO!" Upgrade-Optimus suddenly shouts as he starts to get back up. "I'll never quit! Not Now! NOT EVER!!!!!" He screams, so loud that those living in Australia can hear. He then turns to the shocked Seven with a look of determination as he creates a sword on his left to match the one on his right. "I'LL TAKE YOU ALL ON!"

"RAAAAAAAAAAAAAh!" Ben shouts while charging.

Homelander tries to fly in for a quick blow, but Upgrade-Optimus slashes him down diagonally with his right blade. Then swings his left blade towards the right, hitting Maeve, while spinning around he does a backslash with his right blade at Noir. This breaks the swords Black Noir we're using to block.

Starlight tries to fire her one of her light blasts, but Shifter blocks it with his left blade. He then jabs at her with his right, this doesn't pierce her skin, but it still hurt and sent her back some distance.

A-Train, who ran away to build up speed, comes in for a high speed punch. But swings his right arm and detaches his sword so it's spinning like a frisbee towards him. This forces A-Train to slide under to avoid being chopped. Exactly what Ben wanted.

Cause now he can fire dozens of metal spikes from his right wrist not having to worry about him dodging. These hit mainly his legs and torso with a few hitting his arms. "Get the point." Ben quips.

Eventually A-Train stops sliding and is just laying on the ground with metal spikes all over and unable to move. "I-I can't move my legs." A-Train grunts as he realizes his nerve points or whatever.

'One down four to go.' Ben thinks as he tosses Homelander while simultaneously kicking away Noir. He then slashes away Maeve's leg she was trying to kick him with and grabs her headpiece causing her hair to fall in front of her face. She immediately tries to clear it, but when she does she's just in time to see Upgrade-Optimus grab her face.

Ben then flings her to the side of a building, before grabbing her once again and spinning her around to throw her at a rising Homelander. The caped supe and his ex tumble down the street while Ben continues to fight.

Black Noir tries to jump on Shifter's back, but the Hero see's this and spins around with his remaining left blade hitting the Dark Vought supe with the flat part. He gets hit right inside a nearby cookie store and into their selection of nut based cookies. And doesn't come back out.

With Black Noir

As Black Noir tries to get up he starts to feel his throat closing and hives starting to form. Due to the fighting, sections of his suit have been torn off allowing his allergies to react faster. Breathing heavily he quickly reaches for the container one of his grenade pouches. Pulling out several pills he ingests them before lying back and passing out.

Back to the fight

Ben now grabbed Starlight who was desperately trying to fight back. Holding both of her arms down Ben looked into her glowing eyes and said. "Sorry about this Annie." Before throwing her to the wall of a building and launching a metal formed claw to pin her there. Upon impact she passed out from both the hit and the exhaustion, as did Maeve earlier.

But Homelander was still in the fight.

As evidenced by the fact he was flying at his opponent with the intention of killing him. Witnesses or not.

"COME ON!" Upgrade-Optimus shouted as he readied for him. Making a hook on his right hand Ben, like in his first fight with Homelander, waited until the last second before moving to the right just enough. Allowing him to dodge the hit then used his hook to grab the cape, actually making hole.

However Ben had to dig his feet and his left sword into the pavement to keep himself in place. Even then Homelander still dragged him several feet before an audible SKRRRRR was heard and Homelander flew a little further before stopping.

When Homelander landed he reached for his American flag cape to examine the damage. He saw a giant tear from the center down to the end. This infuriated him. His eyes glowed red as he spoke. "You're gonna-."

He never finished since as he turned around Shifter was already running at him, dragging left handed sword on the ground for an upward diagonal slash on his chest. "Gah." Homelander said in surprise as he was forced to back up and cause him to look toward his back left.

Homelander then fired his heat vision and turning his towards Ben who then had to lean to his right and duck to avoid it. Ben respond by swinging his blade from his right to left at Homelander's calf forcing him onto his right knee. The Seven leader tried swinging his left arm, but Ben blocked it with his left. Upgrade-Optimus then proceeded to repeatedly punch the side of Homelander's face with his right fist.

This went on for several moments until Shifter grabbed the only conscious member of the Seven by collar and threw him face first into a wall. "Taaaake this!" Upgrade-Optimus roared as he was about to, literally, stab Homeland in the back.

The supe reacted quickly, moving so his left side was at the wall so Shifter only stabbed concrete. He then quickly right punched the arm so the sword broke off and was still embedded into the wall. After that delivered a strong left punch to his enemy's left side causing him to stumble back. This was followed up by a blast of his heat vision forcing Ben back some distance.

Once the lasers stopped Upgrade-Optimus stood triumphantly. "Is that the best you got?" He taunted as he raised his fists, as a boxer would.

Annoyed by his arrogance Homelander starts to march forward, but his arms are at his sides. As they got close enough Homelander did a wild swing with his right. Ben blocked this and threw a right jab to Homelander's chest. The Seven leader then tried to fire his heat vision, but it was sent upwards via a left uppercut to the chin.

What followed up was Ben seemingly recreating the rope-a-dope between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman's Rumble in the Jungle, only Homelander wasn't able to block properly. With Upgrade-Optimus delivering back to back punches all over Homelander, even after he was pushed up against the wall. "Is that really the best you can do you blondie?" Ben asked, still keeping up with the punches, even causing some blood to leak from Homelander's nose.

Getting tired of these repeated hits Homelander was more determined to beat Shifter. After a short while he figured out the timing of Upgrade-Optimus's punches, he head butted him at the right moment. This stunned the Omnitrix wielder allowing Homelander to deliver a couple of his own punches and fired his heat vision.

Before he could recover Homelander flew at Ben, pushing him against the wall of a building. "Here's the best I can do." He tells Shifter before tightening his grip and flying up, dragging him along the side. Then once high enough tossed him into the air and punched him down into a construction site. When Shifter landed there Homelander flew down and fired his heat vision along the supports collapsing the partially built super structure on top of Ben in a pile of metal and rubble. Fortunately Homelander had the foresight, or maybe luck, that nobody was there at this time and nobody was hurt from the collapse.

"I guess that's that." Homelander says with a smile, as he wipes his face where he finds out his face has a few scratches on it. One of which draws a bit of blood down his cheek, to add to the blood coming from his nose. Still though he maintains poise and waves to a few cheering civilians and starts to walk over.

In the rubble

As Ben was about to fade into unconscious he started to hear an annoying dweeby voice. "Get up you Doofus you can't let that selfish jerk win. Think about what'll happen."

"Not... strong... enough... too tired..." Ben replied slowly and quietly, about to fall asleep.

"Guess Grandpa Max was wrong when he said you could be a hero." Gwen's voice replied, then pleasantly sighs. "Well at least I was right."

That last part added a bit of extra motivation. Nothing add's more drive than wanting to prove the doubters wrong. He also remembered that this fight isn't about beating the Seven, his part was just about keeping their eyes, and the eyes of the world, on him.

With Homelander

Just as the Seven leader thought he was safe he, and many others, heard a BLAST behind him. Before he could turn around to see what it was.

PEW

A laser blast hits him in the back, knocking him forward.

PEW

Another blast hits him, knocking him back as he tries to turnaround.

PEW

Another blast hits him, knocking him on his knees, just as he finally see's what happening.

Shifter now shifted into Megatron, from Transformers Prime, and ran at Homelander blasting him. After knocking Homelander to the ground with his laser blasts Upgrade-Megatron got close enough to start thrashing the supe with punches, kicks, shoved and scratches.

"THIS!" Grabs Homelander's head. "FIGHT!" Knee's his face. "ISN'T!" Shoves his face down and punches his head. "OVER!" Lifts him up by his collar like a heavy suit case. "YET!" Tosses him towards the rubble and fires him with his right arm cannon.

Homelander growls as he gets back up, but he barely gets on his knees before Upgrade-Megatron hits him with a metal scaffolding. As Ben tries to swing it again Homelander melts much of it with his heat vision. But Ben pushes what's left in his face, which was been super heated from Homelander's own action, resulting in sizzling sound. With a grunt Homelander pushes it off his and kicks off Shifter.

The Seven leader then tries flying at Ben again, but it seems as though he still hasn't learned his lesson. Since again Ben side stepped out of the way and grabbed onto the cape while digging in his feet. Except since he didn't build up as much speed as before Upgrade-Megatron could pull him back and punch him.

And it didn't stop there.

Keeping his left hand wrapped in the cape he pulled back and punched him again. Pretty soon it looked like Homelander was being treated like a paddle toy. Get's hit forward, then is pulled back only to be punched again and repeat. This went on until a chunk of the flag cape was ripped, sending Homelander down some distance.

Tossing the torn fabric aside Upgrade-Megatron charged at Homelander. "Where are you going." Flexes his right arm so a sword pops out. "The action is over here." He adds as he jumps up and to chop him.

Homelander just manages to roll out of the way as the blade lands just two feet away. Ben then lifts the sword and seemingly tries to stab Homelander, who in response fires his heat vision while still on the ground.

Upgrade-Megatron then uses the sword to block the beams and backs up. Homelander then slowly rises while still maintaining his heat vision, that seems to increase in power. Gritting his teeth Homelander upped the pressure by floating up and firing the beams down.

Ben kept up the block, but knew he couldn't keep this up forever. Taking his left hand he reached behind his lower back where he formed Megatron's blaster from Transformers: Dark of the Moon. Like a gunslinger he quickly pulled it out and fired at Homelander's torso.

This stopped Homelander's heat vision and caused him to flip backwards in the air. He quickly corrected himself and flew down to try and rush a Upgrade-Megatron. This time Ben ran at him like he was gonna try to over power him.

Instead though, once he was close enough Upgrade-Megatron leaned back until he started sliding like a baseball player. Then after retracting his sword he aimed his blaster and right arm cannon up and fired. Hitting Homelander right in the stomach and chest at fairly close range.

The shots caused Homelander to be flipped backwards and disrupt the focus he needed to fly and landing on the ground with a smack. Ben then took this chance to run back and literally kicked him while he was down. He continued to run at him and readied the blade on his right arm and with a roar was ready to try and stab him. Even though he likely wouldn't pierce the skin, he knew it would do some damage.

However Homelander flew up just as Shifter thrusted his blade hand to where he was. Flying up some distance he started turning over, making a half circle before flying straight down. He then changed his position so he was flying straight Upgrade-Megatron's back with two fists ahead of him.

Ben barely had time to pull out the sword and turn around before he was tackled by Homelander. "RAAAAAAA!" Homelander exclaimed in rage he kept flying while grabbing onto Shifter's torso to ensure he didn't go anywhere. Ben tried to get out of it by hitting his back, but this only caused Homelander to adjust the position. So now Ben's back was being dragged across the pavement while Homelander punched him. "JUST" Punch. "DIE!" Punch. "AL-" Punch. "REA-" Punch. "DY!" Punch.

To stop Ben tried repeating what he did with A-Train earlier in the fight. But before he could do that Homelander grabbed his chest like one would a shirt, turned over and threw Upgrade-Megatron like a sack of potatoes. What was then seen was Shifter flipping forward as he skipped the ground like a stone on a pound.

Soon though Ben got his bearings and after several flips morphed into Megatron's vehicle form to stop them transformed back into Megatron's battle form. Still though he fell to his knee's and was breathing heavily as his eyes were fixated towards the ground. Despite this he slowly stood up.

From his position Upgrade-Megatron saw that the bomb hadn't gone off yet. Which only meant they haven't been caught yet. Since if they were Vought and Seven would've already tried using them against him. Either as shields or to blackmail.

Still Ben knew he couldn't keep this up for much longer. Either the signal needed to go off for him to leave or he needed to put Homelander out of commission like the rest. But try as he might no matter how many hits Homelander took, he kept getting back up. Though Ben did take pride at being the only person to make him bleed.

But how do you beat a supe that is basically invulnerable to everything you throw at it. 'Stupid Compound V.' Ben thinks. 'Drugs are stupid in general.' He adds to himself as he blinks and his vision shifts to the sky

EUREKA MOMENT

'That's it!' He thinks.

"Give up yet?" Homelander asked as he landed in front of him. He soon started waving to the civilians that were close by. Seemingly forgetting about Shifter.

Ben observes this then comes to a realization. "He he he he he." He giggles. "Ha ha ha ha ha." Chuckles. "Ah ha ha ha ha." Laughs. "AH HA HA HA HA OOOOOOH THE IRONY!" He maniacally laughs. "HAAAAAA HA HA HAAAA!" He bellows out.

"What's so funny?" Homelander asks curiously.

"You!" Ben tells hims with a smile as the laughing subsides. "I can't believe I didn't notice it before. Th-the self entitlement, the-the show boating, your whole-whole-" Bends forward to grabs his stomach as his laughter interrupts him. As he stands up straight. "Oh man that was almost as funny as that SNL Teacher Trial video." (A/N Hilarious Video)

"Where are you going with this?" Homelander asks with confusion.

"YOU'RE..." Shifter points an accusing finger at him. "Acting like me!" Gestures back to himself with his thumb. "When I first got my powers." Points back at Homelander. "You're acting like ten year old kid!"

"What?" Homelander asked confused.

"You heard me." Upgrade-Megatron replied. "You're just a spoiled little brat who was never told no because everyone was afraid of you. And now you need random strangers to love you, cause you think Mommy and Daddy never did. Which is probably true since you're a selfish attention seeking psychopath that nobody could ever love."

SNAP

Enraged Homelander flew straight at Upgrade-Megatron to deliver a right punch at his face. Instead of trying to dodge Ben raised his left hand to grab the punch. The punch still forced Ben back some distance, but Homelander's fist was caught. And even better, for Ben at least, using Upgrade's powers he extended the machinery of his left over to Homelander's caught fist.

Soon Homelander found his fist trapped inside Ben's hand. Grunting in frustration as he tried, and failed to free his hand. So instead tried to use his left hand to hit Upgrade-Megatron, but that was caught and trapped as well. 'Checkmate' Ben thinks.

"Now let's take this battle to new heights." Shifter says to Homelander as he creates and activates the thrusters on his feet and back to fly up. Dragging Homelander with him in the process.

"What's you're plan now?" Homelander asked with confidence as he tried to free himself. "We're just stuck now, and you think you can beat me by going a little high."

"Noooooo..." Ben dragged in response as they started to reach the clouds, while struggling to make sure Homelander didn't deviate them too off course with his squirming. "We're stuck together now and I know I can beat you by going really high." He adds.

Before Homelander can ask what that means they start passing through the stratosphere and the air is getting thin. Eyes widening Homelander looks up to see they're still going higher and his breathing soon starts to struggle a bit.

"You'll kill yourself." Homelander points out, realizing what Ben is trying to do. If he goes up high enough Homelander will suffocate.

"I actually don't need air to breathe in this form." Ben informs in, more accurately guesses since he hasn't traveled in space yet. But so far so good, and Homelander doesn't know that. "But last I checked, even you need to breathe." As they were approaching the mesosphere Homelander began gasping at the thin oxygen.

"Where's all that hot air now?" Ben quips with a smile. He wasn't planning on killing him, just waiting for him to pass out.

Grunting Homelander leaned his body forward, before thrusting it backwards with as much force as he could in his position. This caused the two of them to backwards towards Homelander's direction and they started heading down again. As they got lower Homelander took a deep breath.

"Rah!" Ben exlclaims as he shifts their position back upwards. "No no no. We're only going up from here." He clarified as they started going up again.

As they were Homelander tried head-butting Shifter, but in response his trapper just lowered his arms and forced Homelander to hit his chest. It still hurt him, just not a lot. Still Homelander kept thrashing around, even as his vision started getting a little blurry and they were getting closer to the thermosphere. And should he make it through that, past it was the exosphere, where there was no air at all.

As they were entering the thermosphere Homelander saw and smelled something. He smelt a small amount of gas and saw some sort of liquid freeze.

Light bulb.

If Shifter used motorcycle, car and jet parts to make his robot forms than it stands to reason he had gasoline in them. Also stands to reason that while this 'Upgrade' could enhance technology Gasoline was not technology. Do using every bit of his energy and focus he had he fired his heat vision at one specific point.

Several tense moments pass. UNTIL...

...

...

...

...

BOOM

An explosion happens.

Shifter and Homelander are immediately blown apart by the explosion. Soon both start falling down, and Homelander soon regains his breath. But before he starts to slow down he looks over to a dead falling Shifter.

Since the explosion occurred from inside of his Megatron form it felt like Ben got the wind knocked out of him. It also left him extremely disoriented so that he could not get his bearings. All Ben could tell was that there was a lot of wind and maybe see some shapes, but nothing concrete. Which is likely what he is going to hit.

But even as Ben was falling Homelander flew to him and turned him over so they were face to face. Then he starts punching him repeatedly, while they both go down. "YOU." Punch. "DIE." Punch. "TODAY!" Punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch.

As they fall flames begin forming and they become like a meteor. When they get closer to skyscraper level Homelander floats a little away from Shifter then fires his heat vision. Not only does this do more damage and increase the velocity of Shifter's fall it also sends him towards the same construction site as before. Where the people there were few and was already damaged.

Big Huge Crash

Shifter hits the ground with a thunderous crash, creating a giant dust cloud. It also sends a bunch of destroyed objects flying in different directions, but fortunately nothing incredibly large or dangerous hits any of the civilians nearby.

As the dust settles Homelander is seen landing in front of the crater, soon he's joined by the rest of his team. All of them are still injured and are breathing heavily and clutching maybe an arm.

Black Noir for his part is mostly okay, but still needs his rest. A-Train managed to painstakingly pull off all the spikes that struck him only just recently. Queen Maeve and Starlight had more standard injuries, but nothing broken, or fractured. Homelander had several visible scratches on his face as well as a couple of blood streaks and his normally slicked back hair was completely disheveled and all over the place. Each of their uniforms were either scratched, cut or dirtied in many places.

They, including the growing number of civilians filming the scene, were staring at the crater where Shifter crashed. It was very quite. Should a paper clip fall everyone would be able to hear it.

They then heard the sound of rocks shifting, indicating someone, or something, was moving. Soon a shape of some sort was coming out of the smoke and dust that was still filling the crater. They also started to here a beeping followed by a small blinking red light.

As Upgrade reached onto a nearby piece of rubble for balance while he was getting out of the crater there was a blinding red flash. And Ben became human. For all the world to see.

"Oh my god!"

"A kid?"

"Fuck it's a kid!"

"That's Shifter?"

"Holy Jesus fucking fuck!"

"..."

"No way."

"Fuck."

"Woah."

"He was a kid this whole time?"

"Twisted."

"Damn."

Were the collective reactions of the civilians watching.

The Seven's eyes widened in shock, before blinking and looking at each other. None of them knew how to proceed. It was one thing for a kid to commit a crime, like theft or even grand theft auto. But a kid with the ability to take on most of the Seven and live, that's something else.

As Ben transformed back he looked worse for wear. His clothes were cut up, he had dirt, scratches and bruises all over, his body was sore, his muscles ached, his left arm hurt when he moved it, head throbbing and his vision was blurred. Looking down at the Omnitrix Ben saw it was red, indicating it needed to recharge.

Still he futilely pressed the button hoping to turn it on, but got the expected results. "Uh not now." He groaned in frustration and in pain as he leaned against the rock. Looking up towards Vought tower he saw it was still perfectly unscathed. He still needed to buy more time for Butcher and the rest. 'It's not like I'm getting away now anyway.' He thought.

As Ben was contemplating his options the Seven were in discussion. "What the fuck do we do now?" A-Train says in a hushed, panicked tone.

"Calm down." Homelander tries to reassure.

"Dude we fucked up a kid..." A-Train reminds him. "You might get away with hitting a little white kid, but I won't, at least not as much as you." He points out, Noir nods in agreement.

"None of us could've known." Homelander states. "And he attacked us." He reminds.

"Shouldn't we see if he's okay, he looks hurt." Starlight says, showing empathy. "Who helps him, us, the authorities?" She questions, then turns to Maeve who had a far away look. "Maeve?" Annie calls out.

Queen Maeve POV

Queen Maeve is back in the plane looking into the eyes of those kids she tried to convince Homelander to take. The tears in their eyes. The mom's eyes. Their hands reaching out for help.

Suddenly she's back in the present and see's Shifter's eyes. They could been the same age.

End of Queen Maeve's POV

"Maeve?" Starlight calls again, finally getting the Heroine's attention.

Maeve's head jerks a little before she replies. "What do we do now?" She questions, not making eye contact with anyone, slightly sniveling but disguising it as a inhaling breath.

"Well..." Homelander begins as he turns to his team. "First we."

Thud Crack.

A rock hits the side of Homelander's face, with bits of it breaking off. It did no damage, but what drew their attention was the direction it came from. Towards the crater, meaning only one person could've thrown it.

The kid's left arm had that weird watch and was at his side. While his right hand was casually tossing a rock up a small height before catching. But what really surprised them was his face, he smirked confidently and his eyes displayed amusement.

"Did you forget about me?!" He called out before throwing the rock. It seems as though the first hit was luck as the next one landed on the ground before hitting anyone. Still Ben leans down to grab another rock and says. "Cause last I checked I didn't hear a bell ring." Throws the rock he picked up, again it falls short.

The Seven keep glancing at each other not know how to proceed. "What's the matter you scarred?" Ben baits, before throwing another rock. "Cause if I'm not scarred of a bunch of every day Halloween dweebs then you shouldn't be afraid of the greatest hero of all time." Picks up another rock.

"It's over it's time to surrender." Homelander tells him.

Ben then takes a second to reply. "Sorry. I don't accept your surrender."

"Look-." Homelander tries to say, but gets interrupted by the rock he had to deflect.

"Come on Home boy... show me what you got." Ben taunts, picking up another rock and throwing it at Homelander. He then continues to pick up rocks. "Come on your Royal lameness." Throws a rock towards Maeve. "What about you Dork Knight? Wanna take me on." Throws a rock to Black Noir. "Chuggington, do you wanna get beat again." Throws a rock at A-Train. "What about you light switch." Ben throws the rock at Starlight, but stumbles slightly and loses a bit of balance, causing him to get on one knee.

"You can't win, give up." Homelander tells him. "You keep going, you're gonna die." He adds, restraining himself from attack the kid who humiliated him multiple times.

Ben slowly rose back up and with determination. "I... DON'T... CARE.." Then gripping the last rock he picked up he threw it at Homelander. And when it hit Homelander's torso.

DISTANT EXPLOSION

The Seven and many people around them turned towards the direction of the explosion. Which was on a floor of Vought Tower.

Seeing this Ben smirked. 'They got out.' He thought, glad they finally did it. Exhaustion finally then began to take over, still smirking Ben fell to his knees then. "We win." He said in a low volume so low that only only Homelander could hear, just before passing out.

Before Homelander or the other members of the SEVEN could go investigate they are stopped by a slew of things. Namely reporters.

"Did you kill that boy?"

"Did you know you were fighting a child?"

"Is Translucent really dead?"

"What now?"

"Do any of you think you have committed Corporal Punishment or abused that child?"

And such other things they ask, but receive no reply. Partially because they have no idea themselves.

With Butcher and the Others

Thanks to the bomb Frenchie set up before left the floor with the records they were all able to rush out and blend in with the other Vought workers leaving in a mob. The Boys still had to walk around Kimiko and Elena just in case in order to make sure nobody can see and blood that's still visible.

As they got to the van around the corner Hughie got a notification on his phone. Pulling out his phone Hughie called them out. "Uh guys. Might wanna look at this." Turning over his phone he showed

"Mon œil!" Frenchie gasps in shock.

"Oh shit." MM gasps.

On the phone was a live news feed of Ben passed out on the ground with a headline reading. 'Shifter Identity Revealed!'

Butcher looked at the news for a moment before taking the phone and smashing it on the ground. "The fuck are you doing, they can track that shit now since they know who we are." He then opens the van door and orders. "Not let's go before the Seven or the Ole Bill find us."

"Butcher." Mother's Milk began with a stern expression

"Unless you wanna get fucked by Vought now GET IN." Butcher demands as he opens the drivers side and turns on the engine. "We can't get him out if we're stuck with him." He adds. Soon the rest of the team start piling in and Butcher drives off.

Elena is still silent as she curls up next Kimiko who wraps her arm around her. Frenchie then sits next to them, putting a hand on Kimiko's shoulder.

Hughie sits across from them, his heart beating a million miles a minute and starts to hyperventilate. He then feels someone's hand on his right hand, looking to his right he saw Robin again. And as she conveys sympathy through her eyes his panic soon dissipates.

Mother's Milk simply as an angry expression as he sits in the drivers seat and looks out the window. Occasionally also looking at a photo of his family, his mind wandering towards how Ben would be treated as a Vought prisoner. He glanced over to Butcher who has a blank expression and thinks. 'I'm gonna kill this mother fucker.'

As Butcher drives the van towards the hideout a single tear rolls down his left cheek.

Deep in the Atlantic

Vilgax was swimming straight towards... somewhere. It didn't matter once he found land he would get his bearings and find the Omnitrix wielder. When he was thrown into the portal he experienced a pain that was only compared to when the ship that brought the Omnitrix to earth nearly killed him. "I'm coming Tennyson." He spoke in a mantra as a multitude of sea creatures avoided him.

Thank you for your patience, this took a while to write and parts kept getting deleted. So a lot happened, Ben getting captured, Becca is alive, Edgar and the Boyz, plus the Girlz, managed to escape. You might think me doing the Alien Swarm reference didn't really amount to anything and you'd be right.

The fight was the toughest I had to do, I hope I explained it well. I was never the best with describing things. Still I hope you enjoyed it and comment what your favorite part was. Also don't hesitate to give me suggestions in a DM or comment, just keep it respectful.

Also the rap Ben did with our Special Guest star Nicki Manaj was from Fasttracks part in B-Lo's 'Another Level' on YouTube. His raps are good check 'em out.

Anyway stay tuned for next chapter. These next few are gonna be AWESOME!

You can tell because of the capitalization.