Enhancement

"Our fighting strength isn't quite up to scratch right now..."

After weighing his options, Rorschach opened the System Shop and began browsing.

It wasn't that they lacked fighting strength. It was that the strength they had was unreliable.

Kimiko listened to him, but her combat ability was limited. She could barely handle ordinary humans.

Starlight, meanwhile, had nowhere near enough experience fighting Supes.

Butcher and his crew had no trouble going for the kill, but they had no superpowers.

So Rorschach had arranged for a drug to appear ahead of schedule: Temporary Compound V.

Unlike Compound V, which Vought International had spent years refining, this drug glowed yellow-green.

It no longer had to be injected during childhood. Instead, it granted superpowers for twenty-four hours.

In the original story, the drug wouldn't appear in Vought International's labs for another year.

And just three to five doses could turn an adult man's brain into something like cheese and send it running out of his ears.

The small vial Rorschach bought from the shop cost ten points, and its side effects weren't as severe.

The user would only vomit fluorescent green liquid for about a week.

Even so, Rorschach wouldn't hand it out to his people unless he had to.

Absolute power didn't bring absolute justice. It laid bare a person's true nature.

Trusting that none of these people had a bad bone in their bodies? He might as well ask Starlight to persuade Homelander to mend his ways.

"Next..."

Using Superman's template felt great, but he had to be realistic. Being nothing more than a showpiece wouldn't do, so Rorschach decided to improve his basic physical abilities.

After turning it over in his mind, Rorschach gritted his teeth and selected a template costing fifteen hundred points.

Deathstroke. A top-tier assassin whose body had reached the peak of human ability and whose mastery of firearms and melee weapons was second to none.

That might not sound like an especially powerful ability, but paired with Temporary Compound V, it would be formidable.

After all, Butcher had managed to trade a couple of blows with Translucent, a member of The Seven, using nothing but a crowbar.

The fighting skills of Vought International's superheroes—or at least its public-facing ones—were truly abysmal.

Then again, when they could punch straight through an opponent's skull, why bother learning all that fancy stuff?

Rorschach still believed that more skills would make them far more effective at dealing with crime.

What? Most of the jobs they got were photo shoots?

Never mind, then.

Ring, ring, ring—

Rorschach picked up the phone while adjusting to the changes in his physical strength.

"Hello?"

The caller ID showed Annie, but Rorschach still made his voice a little hoarser.

"I asked my mother. What you said was true..."

Annie had rushed back to see her mother, who herself had only returned from New York a few days earlier.

But Annie knew her mother far too well. There was no way she could keep that secret from her.

Even her father's departure—and the love she had grown up without—had been caused by that dose of Compound V.

She could barely remember how she had made it back to New York through her tears.

But life had to go on, so she called Rorschach.

"You were right. If I hadn't known, I could have been happy."

Tears welled in Starlight's eyes, but she had to hold them back. She didn't want the media to see that she had been crying during the interview later.

This interview, after all, would be about The Deep's harassment.

"There are more terrible truths to come. When you're ready, I'll tell you."

Starlight went on talking with Rorschach for a long time about her childhood and all the classes she had taken growing up.

Before she left, her mother had shouted at her, "I did it for your own good! It was for both our dreams!"

But Starlight understood now. It hadn't been their dream. It had been her mother's alone.

The gathering after gathering she had attended since childhood had already shown Starlight how devoted her mother was to the Church.

Her mother had desperately wanted to be closer to God, and the enormous payout had made it all the more tempting.

Now that Starlight had made it, all that effort seemed to have paid off. Of course that was worth celebrating.

But what if her abilities hadn't been impressive? What if she hadn't been compatible with Compound VII?

Starlight couldn't bear to think any further. The bigger question was: how many children were suffering through the same thing right now?

It only strengthened her resolve to stand with Rorschach.

This was no longer just about love and trust. It was about the future of an entire country.

Starlight could hardly imagine how many people would suffer if the bill to bring Supes into the Defense System passed.

She smoothed her hair, then strode onto the set.

"Starlight, you're looking great! You've got this!"

Ashley gave her a broad smile and cheered her on from the side.

Starlight, transformed and radiating confidence, took her seat for the interview.

"I wonder what power I'd get?"

Rorschach studied the Temporary Compound V in his hand, then put it back into the system storage with some unease.

He had mastered all the fighting techniques and finished adjusting to his new physique.

He could say without exaggeration that, as long as Kimiko stayed out of it, he could easily take down the other three members of The Boys team.

With Kimiko joining them in a head-on fight, though, it would probably be an even match.

"Butcher went to see the CIA. We'll find out what intelligence he managed to get this time."

Marvin came over to Rorschach and spoke quietly.

"You all know what he wants, don't you? He won't settle for anything until he's had his revenge."

Rorschach was unconcerned. Butcher wanted Becca back, and he wanted Homelander's head.

There was no way his talks with the CIA would work out.

If the CIA had that kind of power, Vought International would never have grown into such a giant.

It had grown so big that even if someone wanted to bring it down, countless powerful groups would step in to stop them.

"Walk away, Marvin. Soldier Boy will get what's coming to him. You'll see it on the news."

Rorschach meant every word.

Unlike the others, who had no ties holding them down, Marvin—the conscience of the team—had a wife and daughter.

That was dangerous. Faced with Supes, they could be taken hostage and throw the whole team into disarray.

"No. This team really needs me."

Marvin knew his two teammates could be too impulsive. They were capable of doing something extreme.

He was the team's safety line. If he left too, he couldn't imagine what might happen with Rorschach leading them.

But then he thought of his wife and daughter, and of that raging fire long ago.

Butcher pushed the door open and returned just in time to find Marvin looking troubled.

On the sofa, Frenchie and Kimiko were watching television. Frenchie was muttering something under his breath.

Rorschach appeared to be leafing through a book.

Butcher was sometimes more nervous facing Rorschach than he was facing a Supe.

He couldn't quite explain it himself. Maybe it was an instinct he had picked up from all those brushes with death.

"The people over there got cold feet. What do we do now?"