#h0mlander

"What's up with the cape, homie?" Maybe her mother didn't mean that when she told them to go ahead and get to know each other while she was gone, but it was the best Lynn had. No way she could control her face, though.

@h0mlander || inbox meme reply || oh hiii!

i'm not judging, just saying.

"what makes you think i give two dingleberries clinging to an ape's bare ass if you are judging or not?" the quiet he'd been sitting in was utterly shattered the second this fucker walked in and found him staring out over the city. quiet murmured, as if homelander was approaching a wild animal and trying to soothe it with his voice before it turned around and laid into him query soldier boy didn't give a shit listening to was only tuned in when polished off with a promise he wasn't judging.

only seems to have annoyed the supe even more. green eyes set their harsh stare on the blonde. unwavering. barely blinking. "last thing i need to do is sit here and have some father son bonding moment where i'm sharing my what's on my mind and my feelings like we're in one of those pansy, quitter twelve step cults." shaking his head, he pivots his attention back to the sea of skyscrapers clawing at the ocean of blue overhead. "would rather wipe my ass with sandpaper and use it for a shave."

yet, he doesn't tell him to fuck off.

@h0mlander

Anna was going to kill her own allies if they didn't pull it together - she couldn't even find adequate terrorists anymore, for god's sake - because they were, somehow, being decimated by a single Supe sent by Vought in an attempt to apprehend her again. They had brought one of those noise machines that were making her sick, and she was busy getting rid of them while the idiots died, when suddenly everything stopped. Or, at least, everything in her mind froze when she saw the flying figure come, the blue and red, the blonde hair. Her boy. She lasered one of her own when he aimed a gun at him, even if he was bulletproof, blood splattering all over the air.

"It's you..." Did he know who she was? Was he there for her? Suddenly, she couldn't voice her thoughts, because she didn't know what to call him. Homelander wasn't his name, hell, even John wasn't a name she had picked.

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are you kidding me? i'm not doing that.

incredulous laughter spills out of soldier boy in nearly silent waves. the kind that lights up a sparkle in his gaze. makes his shoulders shake. but does nothing to truly make much noise or give true proof to anyone other than the two of them that it exists. hand swings towards the pair of two very dead supes they now stand in front of. should've given them the information they were looking for. or been trusted enough to keep their mouths shut that homelander and soldier boy came hunting them down with questions that would get them both put under a magnifying glass that, with the slightest tilt towards the revelation, would try to burn their very unburnable (least to death) asses.

trust him. that being burned shit? not a fuckin' trip to disneyland.

even for people like them. so, yeah. the mess they're standing in front of is more piles of meat in clothing. that's what you get when you provoke two of the most powerful supes that exist. and exist together. fucking retards should've just started talking. no. they need to get practically exploded before they cough up all they had. which was barely anything at all. to die for that shit? well. even supes meet darwinism, he guesses.

some   people   simply   refused   to   listen   to   reason   ,   instead   choosing   the   more   violent   and   considerably   more   difficult   path   .   most   cases   of   what   amelia   would   refer   to   as   :   accidental   deaths   due   to   superhero   involvement   ,   could   be   dismissed   with   a   handful   of   (   carefully   placed   legal   threats   )   and   a   payout   substantial   enough   to   secure   a   lifetime   of   silence   .   better   yet   ,   it   allowed   vought   the   opportunity   to   shape   the   truth   however   they   saw   fit   .   every   once   in   a   while   ,   however   ,   an   individual   would   develop   a   spine   .   (   courage   where   none   was   needed   )   .   such   people   were   tedious   endeavors   ,   the   sort   that   forced   amelia   from   the   comfort   of   her   office   and   out   into   the   field   .

it   was   a   delicate   task   ,   then   ,   especially   when   it   concerned   the   poster   child   of   vought   .   (   though   amelia   was   preferably   the   first   to   learn   of   homelander's   bloody   endeavors   )   ,   this   was   the   first   time   she   had   him   accompany   her   directly   to   a   patron's   home   -   though   entirely   unwanted   ,   of   course   .   ❝   .   .   .   all   of   this   could   have   been   avoided   had   i   been   informed   of   the   situation   immediately   .   instead   ,   i   am   now   forced   to   dedicate   valuable   time   and   resources   to   correcting   the   failures   of   less   competent   colleagues   .   ❞   amelia   mumbled   the   words   more   to   herself   than   to   the   man   standing   beside   her   .

fingers   fidgeting   against   the   surface   of   her   tablet   as   she   searched   for   loopholes   within   the   videos   and   photographs   provided   from   the   scene   of   the   crime   .   (   a   few   moments   later   ,   a   slow   sigh   escaped   her   lips   )   before   her   eyes   once   more   drifted   towards   homelander  ( @h0mlander ) .   ❝   .   .   .   it   is   unfortunate   that   you   must   accompany   me   ,   sir   .   however   ,   if   we   wish   to   resolve   this   unfortunate   turn   of   events   ,   it   would   be   prudent   for   vought   (   and   in   turn   ,   you   )   ,   to   present   itself   in   the   most   humble   and   sympathetic   manner   possible   .   ❞

nice.

ashley was not nice. ashley was useful. ashley was terrified and obedient and occasionally competent enough to keep around. but terra clearly needed the word, needed somewhere safe to place the woman who had offered choices instead of commands, so he allowed it for the moment.

“ashley means well,” he said, which was kinder than most things he could have said and less honest than it sounded. “she panics. a lot. but she means well and she was trying to protect you from something she didn’t think you were ready to hear. that doesn’t make it right, but it doesn’t make her bad.”

there. a little generosity. a little fairness. it cost him nothing, and it made him seem balanced. reasonable. the kind of person who could guide her because he was not simply condemning everyone around her. his eyes lingered on her face.

“but you’re right. you deserve to know things about yourself. not all at once. not without help. but you don’t need people whispering around corners and deciding what you can handle like you’re some little broken thing.” his jaw tightened faintly, enough to suggest he found the idea offensive on her behalf, "you’re not.”

then came the question.

can i fight if i don’t kill them?

for a moment, his expression shifted into something almost pleased before he softened it again. that was the important part. not too much approval. not too quickly. she needed to feel as though he was taking the question seriously, not simply rewarding the instinct.

even if he was.

“yes,” he said at last. “you can fight back.” the kind of answer that would matter more because no one had ever given her permission before. “if someone tries to take you, hurt you, control you, put something in your head again—” his voice lowered slightly at that, something colder sliding beneath the words, “then yes. you fight.”

he stepped a little closer, but slowly. still careful. still playing at gentleness because gentleness was working beautifully.

“but fighting isn’t just throwing power at someone because you’re scared,” his gaze held hers. “that’s what they made you do. that’s what kefka wanted. fear in, destruction out. no choice. no control. just reaction. we’re not doing that. heroes fight with purpose. they know what they’re protecting. they know when to stop.”

a faint smile touched his mouth.

“most of the time.”

the small joke was almost warm, though the edge beneath it remained unmistakably him.

“that’s what you’re going to learn. Control. Restraint. How to stop someone without destroying everything around you. How to make sure the right people are afraid of you.”

his eyes narrowed slightly with emphasis. another pause.

if you’re not sure,” he continued, gentler again, “you come to me.” there it was again. the center of it. the point he kept circling her back toward. not ashley. not a therapist. not some committee of nervous executives trying to decide how to turn her into a product without frightening shareholders.

him.

“so yes,” he said quietly. “you can fight. but until you learn control, you fight with me there. understood?”

Everyone seemed to 'mean well' around her nowadays, the difference between Vought Tower and Kefka's lab was like heaven and hell; nobody was hurting her, nobody was attacking her. So really, she could understand why Ashley would be particularly anxious to tell her the truth; between Terra having enough power to destroy an entire city and such a nasty past, the poor woman must have been worried she'd lose control.

Had she ever really lost control? She couldn't tell Homelander that she didn't think so - she felt bad about killing Kefka's soldiers, and that likely played a part on why the heroes had welcomed her. But her sincere pain at the thought of taking life didn't mean it had been an accident, and that--that was the opposite of heroic. Of a mistake. It had been a very clear choice to her. She'd tell him, but not yet.

That was why she couldn't clarify that she already had restraint, because she'd have to explain she had chosen to kill the ones complicit in her torture, and it was a can of worms she wasn't ready to open.

"Oh, of course I'll come to you! I meant--I meant if I was being actively attacked, if someone was trying to kill me, I wanted to know if I could fight back then. But if the situation gives me enough time to come to you, obviously I will. You are in charge. And you know... everything. Everything better than me. How all of this works... I don't even... you know, I don't even think it's my amnesia, I just... never left that lab before. I'm almost sure I wasn't allowed to come out until he put that thing on my head, and by then I wasn't there." Again, that note of disgust and anger in her voice, that made her so uncomfortable but came out so freely when she spoke of Kefka and the way he had controlled her.

The Driver shrugged his shoulders, blinking slowly, while he chewed thoughtfully on his toothpick between his lips, glancing up at Homelander. "Why don't you do something about it?" He tilted his head slightly, raising a brow.

The Driver looked up at Homelander, huffing lightly, his expressed was stoic, his mask firmly placed. "No, as much as I'd love to." He mumbled quietly, his hands stuffed in his jacket pockets.