"Others?"
Clark looked confused. He was still trying to figure Jude out—it was a work in progress—but he was certain that neither of them had spent any time since arriving in this universe making contact with underground groups or mysterious outside forces.
"Too many people around," Jude said. "Keep talking and we'll draw attention."
He drained his iced orange juice in one swallow and set the glass back down.
"Leave the rest to me. Go back."
Clark trusted him. In all his years, outside of Bruce, he hadn't met many people with Jude's knack for adaptation and operational strategy. But trust didn't stop him from worrying.
"Be careful. Vought's heroes—some of them are dangerous. Homelander, for instance—"
"I'm less worried about Homelander." Jude slowly spun the empty glass. "Do you know the mayor of Baltimore's schedule for the next few weeks? The part that actually concerns me is Vought's senior management. Those people know exactly where the lines are in a dirty game, and they don't cross them without a reason. But pressure changes how they think. Push a powerful organization into a corner and they start looking for options that ordinary people can't track or stop." He paused. "And they happen to employ several people with very specific skills."
Clark's eyes drifted toward the Vought building. High up, moving fast, a shape appeared briefly against the dark clouds and vanished. Higher up, the navigation lights of a commercial flight blinked red across the sky.
"Go," Jude said. "I'll handle the rest from here."
Clark stood up and left.
Jude stayed at the counter for a while. He ordered another orange juice, drank it slowly, then paid and walked out into the street. He walked at a casual pace, taking the long route toward Butcher's safehouse.
Behind him, a figure in a hooded sweatshirt and a plain mask pushed through the crowded exit, moving with a clear purpose.
He stepped onto the sidewalk, watched Jude walk toward the far end of the block, then looked up at the empty sky where Superman had been.
Stepping into a side alley, he pulled out his phone and sent two quick text messages. He pocketed the device, stripped off the sweatshirt and jeans, and threw the bundle into a trash can. He stood perfectly still. His skin darkened, his edges softened, and the light bent around him until he disappeared completely into the shadows of the alley.
Translucent had been fixated on Superman since yesterday.
He had noticed Homelander's expression when he returned to the building this afternoon. It was tighter than usual, the specific look Homelander got when his status was threatened and he was trying to hide his reaction. Translucent had put the pieces together. Today was the power testing session, and the results hadn't gone the way Homelander wanted.
What happened next was even more interesting.
Superman had made a phone call inside the Vought building, completely out in the open without trying to hide it. Then he had left.
Meeting a friend. Nothing to say over the phone.
Translucent had chewed on those words. People didn't meet in person to say nothing; they met because the information wasn't safe for a phone line. It was a distinction most people would miss, but Translucent wasn't most people.
Standard logic would have stopped anyone else from following. Tailing a supe was a good way to get caught. Supes assumed only other supes could track them, so they watched for x-ray sweeps, super-hearing, and high-tech detection. They didn't look for a guy in a mask and cheap clothes blending into a crowd.
It was the one thing Translucent actually understood: using invisibility bluntly was a giveaway. An invisible shape moving through a room showed up on x-ray vision immediately. But a normal-looking guy with a forgettable face, wearing ordinary clothes and moving at the same pace as everyone else in a busy bar, didn't register at all. He had no presence to notice.
He had started using this method after Homelander caught him. That was the one time he had pushed his luck too far and learned exactly where the limit was.
He had been curious about Homelander—the same curiosity he felt about everyone, the urge to see what the public persona hid when the cameras were off. Homelander had spotted him. The conversation afterward was short: if it happened again, Vought would be looking for a replacement.
After that, Vought put motion sensors throughout the building, and Translucent changed his habits.
But Superman wasn't Homelander, the building wasn't a crowded bar, and Translucent had been bored enough to buy a cheap hoodie and follow a metahuman to a dive bar in lower Manhattan.
I don't believe in perfect heroes. The thought was old and familiar. Everyone in the Seven is worse than they look. Homelander and Superman—what makes them any different?
He had watched them long enough to know the Seven's private secrets.
The Deep had actual gills along his ribcage that he hid under his suit, and his relationship with marine life went far beyond a professional interest.
Queen Maeve visited the same woman so often that friendship was a poor word for it.
Lamplighter hadn't retired; Vought had kicked him out. The official PR story about wanting a normal life was a lie.
Black Noir kept a collection of authentic World War II medals in his room and would spend hours just sitting alone in front of an empty stage, doing nothing at all.
A-Train had a girlfriend. A real, private relationship. On the day that woman had almost died, A-Train hadn't been stopping a bank robbery or chasing a criminal; he had been leaving his girlfriend's apartment.
Translucent found these details amusing. Seeing the gap between the public image and reality was the only thing he never got tired of. In a way, it was his only real connection to the world.
His own lifestyle wasn't much better. His days were a predictable routine of drugs, parties, drinking, and whatever Vought contract work he couldn't get out of. He cared about money and very little else.
But he still had one hobby left—the one that came naturally from his power. He didn't like to think about it too closely, because labeling it accurately would mean facing a truth he didn't want to live with.
They're all hypocrites, he thought, watching Jude move through the pools of light on the pavement. Every single one. The public version and the private version never match. I've seen enough to know better.
He moved silently through the dark, keeping his distance as he followed.