The news broke within hours.
"Homelander is Dead."
The headline screamed across every screen in the country. Martial law was still in effect, but the chaos felt different now — electric, uncertain, almost hopeful.
Vought Tower was in full damage-control mode. Executives scrambled. Lawyers worked through the night. But it was too late. Butcher had leaked everything before the final attack — videos, documents, recordings. Homelander's crimes spilled out like poison.
Mass murder. Rape. Torture. The Flight 37 cover-up. The Compound V experiments on children. The assassinations. The way he had manipulated and broken The Seven for years.
People who had worshipped him for decades now watched in horror as the truth flooded social media, news channels, and leaked files. Protests turned into celebrations in some streets. In others, riots broke out as die-hard supporters refused to believe it.
And in the middle of it all… I stood on the rooftop of Vought Tower the next morning, wearing my updated costume, facing a sea of cameras.
My hands were still glowing faintly — golden light mixed with faint red sparks from Homelander's stolen power. My body felt heavier, stronger, unstable. Every breath reminded me that something monstrous now lived inside Annie's perfect form.
A reporter shoved a microphone toward me. "Starlight! The world wants to know — were you aware of Homelander's crimes? Did you help him?"
I looked out at the crowd. My throat was tight. Tears pricked at my eyes, not fake ones for the cameras, but real ones.
"I… I was trapped," I said, voice cracking in that soft, melodic way that still belonged to Annie. "He controlled everything. He made me smile next to him while he did terrible things. I was scared. I was alone."
The words tasted bitter because part of them were true.
But another part — the part that used to be Kevin — stayed silent about the worst secret of all.
The body-snatching.
The brain transplant.
The fact that the real Annie January was gone forever, and I was the intruder wearing her skin.
While the world focused on Homelander's crimes, Vought worked quietly in the background. Stan Edgar's remaining loyalists made sure the evidence of the procedure was erased. Files deleted. Scientists paid off or disappeared. The operating theater in sub-level 7 was scrubbed clean and rebranded as a "medical storage room."
No one would ever know that The Deep's brain had been placed inside Starlight's body.
No one would ever know that the woman standing here, speaking so sweetly to the cameras, wasn't Annie at all.
I hated how relieved that made me feel.
After the press conference, I went back to the penthouse alone. The city lights sparkled below like nothing had changed. Homelander's black silk sheets were still on the bed. His cape hung in the closet like a ghost.
I sat on the floor with my back against the window, knees pulled up to my chest.
My new powers hummed under my skin — too much power. Annie's gentle light now carried Homelander's destructive red energy. When I got emotional, red sparks would flicker in my golden glow. It scared me.
"I didn't ask for this," I whispered to the empty room. "I didn't want to be a god."
Tears rolled down my cheeks.
The old Kevin would have celebrated Homelander's death. Would have laughed that the bastard finally got what was coming. But now? Now I was stuck in this beautiful, powerful body, carrying part of the monster inside me.
And the worst part?
A small, dark corner of my mind felt… free.
No more nightly visits from Homelander. No more being his toy. No more pretending to be the perfect victim.
But the body-snatching crime being deleted also meant something else:
There was no going back.
No one would ever believe me if I told the truth. They would think I was crazy. Or worse — they would hunt me as a monster who stole Annie's life.
I looked at my hands. Golden light with red veins pulsing underneath.
"I'm sorry, Annie," I said quietly. "I'm so fucking sorry."
Somewhere deep inside, the voice that was slowly becoming more Starlight than Kevin answered softly:
You're not Kevin anymore. You're not Annie either.
You're something new.
I stood up slowly, wiped my tears, and walked to the mirror.
The woman staring back wore a slightly altered costume — deeper neckline, glowing threads, shorter skirt. She looked strong. She looked beautiful.
She looked like the hero the world desperately needed right now.
I touched the star on my chest.
With Homelander gone and his crimes exposed, Vought was already pushing a new narrative:
"Starlight was the victim who survived the monster."
"Starlight will lead us into a better future."
And because the transplant files were gone… no one would question it.
I took a deep breath and let my powers flare gently — a soft golden light that pushed back the red sparks for a moment.
The timeline had truly changed.
Homelander was dead.
His crimes were out in the open.
And the ugly truth about how I got this body had been quietly erased from existence.
Now the only question left was:
What kind of Starlight was I going to be?