In less than three minutes, Billy Batson's entire life history appeared on the screen in exhaustive detail: his abandonment as a child, his passage through multiple foster homes, his countless attempts to run away, and even the current address of the birth mother he had longed for and desperately searched for all these years.
As Lex Luthor read the information, the smile on his lips deepened.
He casually switched off the screen, grabbed his trench coat, and strode toward the private helipad on the roof.
An hour later, on the streets of Philadelphia.
Billy crouched all alone beside a phone booth, his enormous body, over six feet tall and bulging with granite-like muscles, curled into a ball like a terribly wronged giant bear.
Why wasn't he sheltering from the wind inside the phone booth?
Because a middle-aged woman had wanted to use the phone earlier and driven him out with a torrent of abuse.
Although he was now big enough to send both the woman and the phone booth flying with a single punch, deep down he was still a ten-year-old who instinctively shrank back when adults lost their temper.
Just then, a black Rolls-Royce Phantom with New York plates slowly pulled up beside Billy.
The dark rear window rolled down. Lex Luthor studied the giant by the roadside, dressed in a ridiculous red skintight suit with a glowing lightning bolt on his chest, and a flicker of barely concealed shock crossed his eyes.
He really had turned into a muscular adult!
The scrawny little kid in the files was now, in sheer build alone, even burlier than Superman.
"Billy Batson?"
Lex Luthor tentatively called out the name.
Billy jerked his head up and scrambled to stand straight like a schoolboy whose teacher had called his name, nodding repeatedly.
"That's