fictionpage Chapter 12 The Battle of New York
Chapter 12 The Battle of New York
"Abnormal life signs detected underground in Lower Manhattan." The operator's voice was calm but urgent. "Coordinates: East longitude... Depth: -57 meters... Signal strength... Good heavens."
"explain."
A deep voice came from the command post.
The speaker was in his fifties, bald, and wearing a dark gray combat uniform with the Global Mutant Affairs Center badge pinned to his chest. He had an old scar on his face that ran from his forehead through his left eye to his chin, making his left eye appear to be always squinting.
Although he actually has no vision problems.
Cissell. Director of the Global Center for Mutant Affairs.
"The signal strength... is... four hundred times that of a normal mutant." The operator's voice began to tremble. "No... wait... it's still rising... five hundred times... six hundred times... one thousand times!"
Cecilia's expression remained unchanged.
"Show live feed".
The holographic screen switched to displaying videos transmitted from satellites and drones.
In the footage, a massive crater has appeared near Hudson Yards, with cracks continuously spreading around its opening. A 12-13 meter tall monster is seen dipping its head into the crater, its mouthparts frantically "sucking" something.
The operator zoomed in on the image.
They saw it.
Living people were sucked out of the pit and swallowed by the monster.
"My God..." another operator whispered.
Cecil remained expressionless. He picked up the communicator and pressed the group's public channel:
"Iceman, Lightsworn, Supernova, immediately abandon your current mission and head to Hudson Yards in Lower Manhattan. I repeat, immediately head to Lower Manhattan. Yellow Flash is in Brooklyn, too far away, don't wait for him, Homelander is still here."
"I am here."
The voice of the homelander came through the communicator, calm, composed, and even tinged with a hint of impatience.
"I'm already on my way. Less than a minute."
Cecil frowned. He didn't ask how Homelander knew about the situation here.
"Homelander, you need support. That monster's evolutionary path is towards its sense of smell. Although it's not as big as the one in the city center, its devouring speed is incredible."
"I told you, I'm on my way."
With a soft click from the communicator, Homelander switched off the public channel and onto an encrypted private line with the Prometheus.
Cecil pressed the hotline: "Homelander, this monster is devouring civilians, and you're all alone."
Are you questioning my abilities, Cissel?
The voice of the Homelander remained calm, but Cissel sensed a chill in it.
"I'm not questioning you. I'm just stating the facts. Your primary responsibility is to protect civilians, and to prevent more casualties from resulting from your refusal to provide support."
"Are they dead?"
"What?"
"I ask you, those civilians, are they dead now?"
Cissel fell silent.
"They might die a few before I get there," Homelander said with a chilling nonchalance.
"But as soon as I arrive, they'll be safe. That's a fact. That's what the name 'Homelander' means. You understand, Cecil?"
"..."
"Don't fucking call those people to steal my spotlight."
The communication device was completely cut off.
Cecil put down the communicator and turned to the communications operator: "Keep calling Iceman, Lightgirl, and Supernova. Have them stand by. Don't enter Lower Manhattan."
The operator hesitated for a moment: "But Minister..."
Do as instructed.
As Cisel watched the monster on the screen devouring civilians, his right hand, hanging by his side, slowly clenched into a fist.
.........
When Homelander arrived, Hudson Yards was already half-collapsed.
A huge gap, tens of meters wide, was torn open in the ceiling of the air-raid shelter, exposing a space crammed with terrified people. They scattered and fled, but the air-raid shelter only had a limited number of exits, far from being able to accommodate 12,000 people evacuating at the same time.
The monster is still "absorbing".
Its mouthparts are like a giant black hole, capable of engulfing more than a dozen people with each inhale. Those people are men, women, and children.
The moment it's sucked into the mouth, it's shredded by the spirally arranged barbs, not even having time to let out a complete scream.
Homelander hovered fifty meters above the monster.
He did not act immediately.
Instead, they were "posing".
He stood with his hands on his hips, his national flag cloak fluttering in the high sky, the setting sun casting a golden glow on his silhouette. From the survivors below, he looked like a war god suspended in the sky.
"Homelanders!"
"They're Homelanders!"
"He's come to save us!"
The people in the air-raid shelter began to cheer. Even as the monster continued to devour their fellow countrymen, even as the stench of blood filled every breath, they still cheered.
Because the people of our motherland have arrived.
Because the people of our motherland have come, everything will be alright.
This is the belief they have been instilled with since childhood.
The people of the motherland heard these cheers.
He smiled.
Then he swooped down.
Instead of using heat vision, which was the fastest way, he charged straight at the monster's head. He wanted to kill the monster in the most visually striking way: hand-to-hand combat.
He wanted to show these people how his own countrymen would beat this monster to death, punch by punch.
He wanted them to remember this moment forever.
He adjusted his posture in mid-air, pointed his feet forward, and kicked at the monster's head at supersonic speed.
boom!!!
The monster's head was kicked and turned nearly ninety degrees to the right, and a large area of cracks appeared on its neck, from which black blood gushed out.
The monster let out a sharp shriek without vocal cord vibration, and its massive body slid sideways for more than ten meters under the enormous impact, crashing into an abandoned shop.
An even louder cheer erupted from below.
But before the cheers had even subsided, the monster moved.
Although its neck was broken, its body did not lose control.
During the evolutionary process, giant "beef cattle" have developed stronger recovery capabilities, comparable to regeneration.
Its exoskeleton begins to secrete a black, viscous substance the moment it breaks, repairing the damaged parts at a speed visible to the naked eye.
It didn't give the Homelanders time to react.
Its mandibles suddenly flipped, and the huge mouth that occupied half of its body turned from the front to the side, biting at the Homelander at an incredible angle.
Of course, the people of the motherland can avoid it.
His speed was dozens of times that of the monster.
But he didn't dodge.
Because dodging it wouldn't be "cool".
He chose to block it with his hand.
He clenched his right fist and slammed it into the monster's upper jaw. The instant his fist made contact with the jaw, his entire arm plunged into the monster's mouth. The barbs scraped against his uniform, making a grating metallic sound.
Then he felt it.
pain.
Those spiraling barbs, each as long as an adult's forearm, while unable to pierce his skin, were hard enough to leave indentations on his muscle surface. And the monster was "biting" hard, its jaw muscles contracting at a frantic frequency, putting increasing pressure on Homelander's arm.
It wasn't a fatal wound.
But it hurts a lot.
His posture was such that half of his arm was stuffed into the monster's mouth, his body was tilted and suspended in mid-air, and his cloak was blown about in a mess by the wind.
It was completely at odds with his imagined heroic figure of "smashing a monster's head with one punch".
Damn it.
Just as he was about to pull his arm away, the monster suddenly shook its head.
Homelander was thrown out.
He wasn't thrown out, he was flung out. Like a rag doll being tossed around, he tumbled several times in mid-air before regaining his balance. His uniform was stained with the monster's black blood, there was a smear on his left cheek, and his hair was a mess.
The crowd below gasped in surprise.
It wasn't a cheer.
It is an "exclamation of surprise".
The people of the motherland heard it.
He heard people saying, "Homelander is injured," "He won't be able to beat us, will he?" and "Help, it's still eating people."
That last sentence made him turn his head sharply.
In the few seconds that he was thrown away, the monster had already aimed its mandibles back at the opening in the bunker. Although its jaw muscles were damaged from the previous attack, their "sucking" function was still intact.
One mouthful.
More than thirty people were sucked in.
Two elderly people, seven or eight middle-aged men and women, a dozen or so young people, and a child.
A little girl who looked only five or six years old was wearing a pink dress and had a butterfly hair clip in her hair.
The performance was a failure.
Homelander clenched his fist, but this time he didn't strike any pose.
It shot out like a bullet, stepping through the air.
accelerate.
accelerate.
Speed up again.
His flight speed exceeded Mach 5 in 0.3 seconds. The air was torn apart in front of him, and a sonic boom exploded over Hudson Yards, shattering all the remaining windows within a 200-meter radius below.
He crashed into the monster's body.
Not the head, not the heart, but the thickest part of the torso right in the center.
He pierced through the monster's chest and exited through its back like a bunker buster. His body spun at supersonic speed the instant he passed through, like a giant drill, shredding the monster's internal organs, bones, and muscles.
After passing through, he drew an arc in the air and accelerated again.
The second penetration.
the third time.
the fourth time.
No one could count how many times he pierced through it. With each piercing, the monster's body would spew out a cloud of black blood and chunks of flesh, its size rapidly shrinking as it was "disassembled."
After the fifth piercing, the monster's torso had completely lost its shape.
The sixth time.
The seventh time.
The eighth time.
tenth time.
The monster completely fell apart.
Its body exploded into hundreds of fragments, scattered within a 500-meter radius of Hudson Yards. Black blood mist filled the air, forming an artificial dark cloud.
The homelander hovered in the center of the blood mist.
His blue, red, and white uniform was completely soaked in black blood, and his national flag cape, like a tattered cloth just pulled out of a dye vat, trailed behind him.
His face, hair, and hands were covered in blood. Thick, hot, black blood that reeked of decay.
His chest was heaving violently.
The man from the motherland took a deep breath.
Then, a smile appeared on his face.
That smile was flawless; the curve of the upturned corners of the mouth, the slight squinting of the eyes, and the coordination of the entire facial muscles were all "standard smiles" honed through decades of media training.
He descended slowly.
Passing through the blood mist.
Passing through the pervasive dust.
Through the gazing eyes of more than ten thousand survivors below.
He landed beside the pile of monster fragments, stepping on the ground still flowing with black blood, hands on his hips, chin slightly raised.
He spoke.
The sound wasn't loud, but everyone could hear it clearly.
"You are safe."
silence.
Then came a tsunami of cheers.
"Homelander!!!"
Long live the people of our motherland!!!
"You are our hero!!!"
People cried, laughed, and shouted. They reached out to touch him. Some knelt on the ground with their hands clasped together as if in prayer. Others lifted the child above their heads so he could see him more clearly.
Although there were deaths, he did save the rest of the people.
The people didn't know that if Homelander hadn't stopped others from coming to his aid, if he had used all his strength from the beginning.
No one will die.
All they knew was that the Homelanders had come, the Homelanders had fought, and the Homelanders had won.
They survived.
…………
When Li Ang, Claire, and Ye Ziqing arrived, they witnessed this scene.
More than 10,000 people gathered around the collapsed air-raid shelter, all facing the same direction—the blue, red and white figure that slowly descended from the sky after the blood mist dissipated.
Homelander landed, his cloak still dripping blood. He raised his hand and waved to the crowd, which erupted in another wave of screams.
They fought a bloody battle on that street for several hours until army reinforcements arrived. They drove tanks to pick up all the children and take them to a nearby safe zone.
The group also learned from there that of all the districts in New York, only Manhattan was still completely overrun.
I spent a lot of time preparing myself mentally.
They came here with the army.
As soon as I arrived, I witnessed this quite a show.
"It's too fake," Li Ang muttered to himself.
He wasn't saying the Homelanders' performance was "fake," but rather that the frenzied atmosphere was "fake," as if it were being manipulated by some invisible force.
Although he was still unaware of Homelander's actions, as one of the few ordinary people who had come into close contact with him, he was well aware of the man's hypocrisy.
Claire stood to his left, arms crossed, expressionless.
Her police uniform was still stained with the black blood from killing monsters, mixed with the traces she had just cleaned up, making her look like a veteran who had just come from the battlefield.
Ye Ziqing stood to Li Ang's right.
She stared at the Homelander surrounded by a crowd in the distance for a long time.
Li Ang turned to look at Ye Ziqing and noticed the change in her expression.
At first, it was calm.
Then came the frown.
Then she bit her lip—she bit her lower lip until it turned white, almost drawing blood.
Then, amidst cheers from everyone and waving farewells from the motherland.
Her eyes were fixed on the Homelander, filled with an unprecedented hostility.
She looked at Homelander. Leon looked at her. Claire looked at Leon.
Ye Ziqing slowly opened her mouth and said something that shocked Li Ang.
Her tone was firm and earnest.
"I'm going to kill Homelander."