Soldier Boy

New York, Vought Tower. A little over a year after Homelander's downfall.

There are no signs announcing what lies hidden on level 43. Public elevators only go down to level -2, where cleaning staff keep their carts. To go any lower, you need a biometric key that only one person in the world possesses: Vought's new Director of Special Operations.

The private elevator descends silently for forty-seven seconds. The doors open onto a reinforced concrete corridor, dimly lit by LED strips that flicker with a faint hum. The air is cold and dry, with a faint smell of metal and liquid coolant. Each footstep reverberates off the bare walls, as if the building were breathing through its foundations.

At the end of the corridor, a thirty-centimeter-thick armored door. Code, retina scan, fingerprint. The system emits a deep beep and the bolts retract with a hydraulic clunk. In the center, suspended from a titanium frame anchored to the ceiling and floor, is the cryogenic capsule. Then he appears. Soldier Boy...