Chapter 195: Starlight, Vought's Long-Hidden Mole
"You have no evidence to prove that was me, you can't do this." Starlight's face turned bright red, the intense feeling of asphyxiation made it difficult for her to breathe.
"Do you think I need evidence?"
Homelander's expression grew increasingly twisted. As he gradually exerted strength with his arm, Starlight quickly showed an extremely painful look. "Please stop, the person in the video really isn't me."
She reached out and grabbed Homelander's arm, trying to break free from the restraint, but how could her strength compare to Homelander's?
"Alright, let her go. She's still useful. If you kill her directly like this, it will be difficult for us to explain to the public." Unexpectedly, the person pleading for Starlight was Stormfront.
"Mr. Jervis, announce to the outside world now that the person who stole the Compound V has been found. It's Starlight from The Seven. She secretly colluded with Terrorists, selling Vought's internal information and Compound V, but was ultimately discovered by Homelander and me. Although we find this unbelievable, out of responsibility to the public, we have decided to temporarily detain her within Vought Tower.
After everything is thoroughly investigated, we will announce the details to the public."
Due to the frequent appearance of super terrorists recently, many people had pointed fingers at Vought International, believing that Vought was actively spreading Compound V and maliciously creating super terrorists.
At this time, announcing that Starlight was Vought's long-hidden mole would not only redirect the public's anger but also pin this huge blame on Starlight. It was killing two birds with one stone.
"No problem, I'll announce it as soon as possible."
Xia Shang nodded.
"Since that's the case, I'll spare your dog life for now." Homelander slowly released his hands. On Starlight's fair neck, two deep red palm prints were clearly visible. Having just escaped the restraint, she was gasping for breath like a fish out of water.
"Come with me."
Afterward, Homelander took Starlight to the 42nd floor. Here was a room specifically used to detain Supes. It was entirely cast from steel, with walls two meters thick, basically capable of isolating all superpowers. It was extremely dim inside, with only a few light strips emitting a faint light.
After Homelander removed the light strips, it became completely dark inside. He knew that Starlight's superpower could absorb surrounding electricity, so he had specifically ordered the room's circuit breaker to be turned off.
"Three days. I'll give you three days. If I don't get any valuable information from you after three days, prepare to stay here for the rest of your life." Standing outside, Homelander pressed the button on the wall expressionlessly.
A heavy iron door slowly devoured the light in front of Starlight's eyes.
At the same time.
On the other side.
Hughie was slumped on the sofa in Lamplighter's Villa, watching some "healthy" movies with Lamplighter.
"Pick whichever ones you like." Lamplighter bent down and pulled out a paper box from under the coffee table, filled with various discs.
"Homelander vs. Seven Female Criminals? Or this one, Translucent and His Invisible Tools?"
"You actually collected so many movies about Superheroes?!" Hughie was completely dumbfounded. He casually flipped through them: Queen Maeve's Passionate Years, Young Black Noir Riding a Big Car, Coerced Starlight, The Deep and His Ocean Friends.
"Unconscious Stormfront? Holy crap, isn't she the Superhero Vought just launched?" Hughie exclaimed in shock.
Lamplighter indicated this was standard practice. "You should always trust the speed of producers. By the way, I have the entire series of Stormfront. This is a collector's edition, I usually don't take it out easily."
"Forget it, this one will do." It was a good thing Hughie didn't suffer from indecision, otherwise just choosing a movie could waste his entire afternoon.
"Do you usually spend your days like this?"
"Congratulations, you guessed right." Lamplighter shrugged. "As a reward, you can watch another one."
Hughie then asked, "How did you manage to gloss over that Sage Grove incident? Also, since you know Vought is conducting human experiments on adults, why don't you attend the hearing the day after tomorrow and accuse Vought there? It's your only chance for redemption."
The reason he was staying at Lamplighter's home was to persuade Lamplighter to testify against Vought at the hearing, thereby bringing Vought down directly.
As for Billy and the others, they were also preparing for the hearing the day after tomorrow. Billy had returned home after receiving a phone call from his mother and saw his abusive father. If it hadn't been for his father abusing his younger brother back then, his brother wouldn't have chosen suicide. So when the two met again, it was very unpleasant.
Meanwhile, Mother's Milk followed Mallory to find Dr. Jonah Vogelbaum, trying to persuade Jonah Vogelbaum to attend the hearing the day after tomorrow, but Jonah Vogelbaum flatly refused. Are you kidding? Stan Edgar had already placed Jonah Vogelbaum under strict surveillance. Unless he disregarded his family's lives, how could he possibly agree to Mallory?
"Let me think about it." Lamplighter neither refused nor accepted.
...
Early the next morning, Ashley Barrett found Xia Shang holding a document. "Ever since we announced Starlight was the mole, Twitter exploded. Currently, the top trending topic on Twitter is 'Starlight, Vought's Long-Hidden Mole'.
Besides that, millions of tweets support the legalization of Compound V. Mr. Edgar is very satisfied with this, but the hearing the day after tomorrow is a big problem. He's considering whether to send you to manage the situation."
Xia Shang's fingers paused slightly on the keyboard. "He plans to have me confront Senator Neuman head-on? Are you sure?"
"Mr. Edgar didn't explicitly say, but he wants you to go there."
"I understand."
After pressing the computer's shutdown button, Xia Shang opened his Panel. The Fusion Progress was currently 89%. Next, he had to consider whether to target Homelander to acquire superpowers, but he didn't want to expose himself so quickly. Perhaps he could work on the movies.
Arranging a sufficiently powerful villain should be reasonable. Homelander probably wouldn't refuse to give him face. As for the superpowers of Starlight and others, Xia Shang didn't want to target them for now. Their superpowers weren't particularly strong, especially after he fused Stormfront's superpower. Ordinary superpowers weren't of much help to him, unless they were certain special superpowers, like Psychic Power. He could fuse similar superpowers to make them fuse with each other. Beep! Xia Shang exited the elevator and pushed open the door to the CEO's Office.
"Mr. Edgar, you were looking for me?"
Stan Edgar, behind the desk, put down the steel pen in his hand when he heard Xia Shang's voice. "I called you here because I want you to participate in the hearing the day after tomorrow. I've already arranged your seat; you'll be sitting next to Homelander."
(End of Chapter)