A huge crowd of reporters bolted away from the front of Vought Tower in Manhattan's busiest commercial district. They had already caught wind of the super terrorist attack on the East Coast. These vultures had an insane nose for breaking news. A real exclusive meant fat bonuses.

Sticking around Vought was pointless. Better to rush to the coast and roll the dice.

If they could catch footage of The Seven fighting a super terrorist, they'd hit the jackpot.

Meanwhile, Ashley pushed open the fancy wooden door to the conference room, carrying a shitload of takeout bags. She handed them out according to the labels.

Edgar got a bowl of oatmeal. He stirred it with a metal spoon while staring at the big screen in the room.

Ivan's lunch was way more luxurious: foie gras-marinated salmon and a thick-cut specialty steak, both delivered from a Michelin-starred restaurant.

Most of the others had simple stuff like sandwiches and burgers. Nobody ordered fried chicken.

"Looks like The Deep is about to become a star," Ivan said, spearing a piece of salmon and popping it into his mouth. As Vought's Vice President, he didn't have to hold back anymore.

On screen, The Deep rode a humpback whale that leaped out of the water in a massive spray of waves, landing dramatically right in Butcher's path. It looked like a goddamn Hollywood shot, epic and jaw-dropping.

The executives around the table figured the terrorists would turn tail and run.

They were dead wrong. The bearded guy in front glared with pure murder in his eyes. Instead of running, he gunned the engine even harder.

Splat! The next moment was so nasty that Franko actually spat out his food.

Butcher drove the inflatable straight into the whale's belly. The creature let out a horrible cry as chunks of flesh exploded everywhere. Dark red blood dyed a huge patch of ocean, and guts were visibly spilling out of the wound.

"Oh shit." The scene killed everyone's appetite. Several executives immediately put down their food as acid rose in their throats.

Only Edgar and Ivan stayed completely calm.

The next second, Butcher and the others burst out the other side of the whale's body, covered head to toe in blood. They vanished into a drainage channel on the shore. The tunnel was too narrow for the inflatable, so they had to ditch it and keep moving on foot.

"Fucking terrifying," Butcher muttered, staring at the whale blood smeared on his arm. He urged the others forward. "The Deep's here. The rest of The Seven will show up any second. We don't have much time."

Hughie froze in place, completely shell-shocked by what he had just seen.

"Move your ass, kid."

"Just go without me. Leave me here," Hughie said, eyes blank. A thick layer of blood and guts coated his whole body.

Butcher reached out to grab his shoulder, but Hughie, on the verge of breaking down, shoved him off. "Don't touch me with your filthy hands."

"Fine, whatever. We don't have time for this shit."

In the end, Mother's Milk talked him into it and Hughie finally stumbled deeper into the tunnel.

Outside the drainage channel, The Deep slowly came to after being knocked out. He stared at the dead humpback whale with deep sadness in his eyes. He reached out and gently stroked its skin, muttering softly like he was saying a prayer for it.

That was when Homelander and the rest of The Seven walked up beside him.

"Un-fucking-believable. You couldn't even stop them. What the hell were you thinking? And now you're just standing here like an idiot."

Homelander snapped at him.

"I was worried about Lucy."

"You mean this fat fish? Heh. Then stay here and keep it company, you sick fuck." Homelander glanced at the whale with disgust and headed straight into the drainage channel alone.

Stormfront, walking behind Homelander, watched The Deep's little prayer and couldn't resist mocking him. "You're actually apologizing to a fucking whale? What an idiot."

"Don't get ahead of yourself, newbie."

The rest of The Seven left The Deep behind and entered the tunnel to hunt down Butcher's crew.

...

"Tell Marketing to cut that footage," Edgar said, wiping his mouth with a napkin.

Lunch soon wrapped up. Nobody knew exactly what happened inside the tunnel, but it was clear The Seven hadn't caught the terrorists.

In reality, Homelander had already spotted Butcher. Right as he was mocking him, Mouse suddenly burst out from under the wreckage, using his telekinesis to shred the concrete beneath Homelander's feet and bring the entire pipe crashing down. With a deafening roar, thousands of concrete chunks buried Homelander completely.

The weight was insane.

At that exact moment, a massive hole opened up in the top of the pipe, connecting straight to the outside. Mouse didn't hesitate. He climbed out immediately, with Kimiko right behind him.

Stormfront dropped from the sky like a bolt from hell. Two massive arcs of lightning shot from her palms and slammed both of them flying. Kimiko and Mouse smashed through several walls before crashing hard into an apartment building.

They knew they were outmatched before the fight even started, so they grit their teeth through the pain and bolted for the rooftop.

Stormfront chased right after them. On the way she ran into a witness who had seen her rampage.

Without hesitation, she grabbed the guy by the collar and hurled him off the tenth floor. His screaming drew plenty of attention.

Stormfront decided to go all in. Countless violent bolts of lightning exploded out of her body, tearing apart everything around her.

The entire floor she was on erupted in flames. Gas pipes detonated one after another and the fire spread with terrifying speed.

"Holy shit! Is that terrorist fucking insane?"

Reporters who had just arrived shoved their cameras forward, snapping shots like crazy. Even from hundreds of meters away they could feel the scorching heat pouring out of the building.

Over a dozen police cars escorted two fire trucks to the scene. NYPD officers quickly set up barricades and shoved back the growing crowd of onlookers.

It looked like a goddamn natural disaster. For the first time, both the public and New York cops got a real taste of what a super terrorist could do.

All they could do now was pray The Seven showed up in time.

"Meeting adjourned. Prepare to execute Greevs' plan." Watching the apartment building get wrecked on screen, Edgar immediately ended the meeting.

He knew no ordinary supe could cause this level of destruction. From the footage, it was clearly Stormfront behind it. He just hoped she'd be clean about it and kill the terrorist. That way they could pin the entire mess on the super terrorist.

___

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Read 12 Advance Chapters—P@t- Captain69