QUANTUM~Billy Butcher

Publicity

"He's done it again! A-Train wins! A new world record for A-Train. They say lightning doesn't strike twice. The world belongs to A-Train. A-Train wins. A-Train wins! Stunning! Absolutely stunning."

A-train won, and the cheers were deafening, Athena had to lower her hearing in order to deal with it as she cheered and applauded in an appropriate manner as she stood next to Starlight and Black Noir. She internally groaned, realising how much publicity she'd have to do about this event, as well as briefly mentioning it at the premier next week. "I gave a guy my number!" Starlight slightly shouted to Athena over the noise, noticing she was saying something the older woman put her hearing back to normal. "Come again?" Annie pulled Quantum to one side and repeated what she had said."Oh wow!" Athena smiled."Is he cute? did you just meet him today?" 

There was a sparkle in Annies eyes, she definitely had a school girl crush on whoever this man was, "We actually met the other day on a park bench, but he had no idea I was Starlight then,  but I just saw him and he bought me overpriced beer and nachos." Athena chuckled, linking the girl and walking back down towards the main entrance for photo ops with A-train for his win. "Wow, overpriced beer and nachos, he must really like you." Annie nodded with a cheesy grin on her face. "Well I basically knocked over a guy today so you're having more luck than me with men at the moment" Quantum joked, the pair laughed as they finally reached downstairs and prepared to smile for the cameras.

Prince was waiting for his owner as she came trudging through the door, exaughsted from the days events, Athena kicked her heels off, startling the cat, who 'Meowed' in disappointment "Oh hush," she scolded, with A-trains race and the interviews for her upcoming movie 'Quantum Love'. There was no energy left in her, well physically there was, but mentally? absolutely not. "Shall we order in?"The rhetorical question still got a 'meow' in response, and Athen wasted no time in pulling out her phone and ordering from her favourite pizza spot. With a comedy film on and a large margarita and fries in front of her, Prince curled up by her side on the sofa, life felt like it couldn't get any more perfect. 

But boy, was she wrong.

In the time that followed, a plane was hijacked by terrorists, Maeve and Homelander failed to save anyone as he stated, "We arrived three minutes after the plane went down. And why? Because we're not in the chain of command." her gut was telling her something wasn't right. It seemed too perfect of an opportunity to push Supes to be in the military. If that wasn't enough, at the Believe Expo where Athena was monitoring everything being released to the press about the event and the broadcast itself, Starlight had come out about being sexually assaulted. Athena threw her coffee mug across the room so hard the before it shattered it left a dent in the wall. How could Vought had let this happen? The news were also eating it up like they'd been starved, and as a representative of Vought, she made a statement.

"In light of Starlights brave admission at the Believe Expo two weeks ago, we are doing everything in our power to support her and bring the assaulter to justice. As a company, Vought has also decided to fund the new 'Quantum sanctuary' where women who have suffered sexual assault in and outside the workplace will receive full therapy and advice for prosecution." Her statement was well received, and Annie had given her a very tearful hug, to which Athena invited her to stay the night at her place to get out of the tower. 

The pair were in the kitchen, Annie sat on the kitchen island while Athena cooked up some comfort food, Grilled cheeses and such, and she had made sure to buy a good few tubs of Ben and Jerry's in the freezer ready for dessert. Prince had taken a liking to the new woman in the house, purring and circling her. "I think he likes me." Annie laughed, leaning down to pet his head. "He's very picky about who he likes. Take it as a compliment." Athena used her powers to open the cupboards and have two plates float down for her to dish up dinner. Annie watched in amazement, apart from the race she hadn't seen anything in person of Quantums powers. "What are your powers? like, actually? I know it's something to do with Quantum energy, but what exactly?"

Athena looked up from serving the food "Well" she began "In short my ability is to manipulate aspects of reality on a fundamental scale, so I can't distort it, It just ranges from different matters like the the natural elements and to an extent I can change the very atoms that make up my body." Annie looked in amazement. She had no idea of the extent of Quantums power. "So you can just like, change yourself?" Annie took her plate from the woman and walked with her to the couch still stunned "Technically yes, not full appearance, I mean I change my hairstyle sometimes, but my main advantage is enhancing normal things like eyesight, hearing, strength ect." 

"But what about your glow and your power blasts? What's that?" Athena had to laugh. The girl was just full of questions."That's me simply manipulating the particles around me and charging them with energy, creating blasts." Now it was Annies turn to answer some questions, Athena wanted to get to the bottom of what happened at the tower, but she knew she couldn't push straight away. "Now your turn, I've already read your file, but let's pretend I haven't." She joked, taking a bite of her grilled cheese. "I can manipulate and draw power from nearby sources of electricity to generate, project and emanate blasts of energy-like you- and also blind people with light blasts." It was a cool power to have Athena had to admit, the only disadvantage being that she would be stuck in a situation without any powerlines nearby, but hey, good job, they're in New York. Now, it was time to hit the touchy subject.

"Annie... What happened at the tower?"