E8: Green Lantern #5

[Spider-Man Beyond]

E8: Green Lantern #5
Emerald Dawn
Part 5
A View From the Stars

Written by Russell Burlingame (Borntorun)
Edited by Daniel Dyer (Spider-Man Beyond)

Warrior's right hand turned into a mace and he smashed it against a glowing gold shield hanging a few feet out in front of the evil Guy's face. Evil Guy just kind of grinned and kept his shield up. The Green Lantern ring wasn't able to permeate the shield right away, either, though the cumulative effect of the two heroes battering his defenses was starting to weaken the gold-armored Guy. It was hard to tell, except to the skilled eye, but Kyle's ring chimed in to inform him that the yellow light around evil Guy's shield had started to dim.

“...the hell is this thing, Lantern Lad?” Guy called over the din of all the banging and zapping things. “His powers—they look just like yours...!”

“No idea, man. I have to assume that it's related to the yellow monster-guy.”

As if on cue, there was an explosion behind Guy. Kyle turned to look and was surprised to see not the yellow insect-dragon-creature that he expected, but a large, purple, red-maned beast.

“Vuldarian!” the monster screamed.

Kyle was almost through the sentence, “Guy, do you know what a Vuldarian is?” in his head before its clawed arm slashed across his face, shattering the metal faceplate that the ring had fashioned for him.

“What the hell's that thing?” Guy said, and in the instand that it took him to ask, the other Guy—evil Guy—blasted him in the back. Guy fell to his knees, smoke rising from his armored, tattooed back, and grimaced.

“I really, really don't like you bastiches,” Guy said. “Just to make things clear.” His hands morphed into an axe and a mace, and he charged at the purple monster; his back sprouted a pair of cannons, one on each shoulder blade, and blasted off a pair of rounds in the direction of the evil Guy. Kyle picked himself up off the ground and, while the purple monster reached for Guy, Kyle let the ring carry him in a lazy, looping line, away from the battlefield to clear his head for a moment.

Manoman, Kyle thought. Guy is hardcore. I wonder how long he's been at this.

Still, despite the series of blasts coming from what seemed to be every angle of Guy's person, he was having a hard time standing up against the assaults from both sides. Kyle dove headlong at the yellow-ringed Guy, and this time it was enough; taking him off-guard while he attacked Warrior, Kyle slammed evil Guy into a wall.

“Which of you three is the Vuldarian?” demanded the purple creature. He had a crazed look in what passed for his eyes.

Kyle had a notion, and ring-slung the gold-ringed Guy at the purple thing. “I think this guy here is the Vuldarian,” he lied, and the purple monster caught evil Guy by the head as he was lobbed through the air. Evil Guy retaliated by blasting the creature with his ring, which was joined by a blast from Warrior's shoulder-mounted cannon and a shot from Kyle's ring as well. The purple thing crashed to the ground, and while Kyle grabbed the armored evil Guy and flew him high overhead, Warrior pounced on the thing's chest.

“What in hell?” he sputtered. The creature grabbed at Guy's face, but instead Warrior slashed at its claws with an axe-hand. “What are you?”

“I am Dementor,” the creature said. “You are the last Vuldarian, aren't you?”

“Damn right I am, monkeyface. What the hell's a Dementor?”

“Your brother.”

—

[Spider-Man Beyond]

Above, Kyle asked his ring, “What's the deal with this yellow ring thing?”

{Yellow ring is composed of Qwardian ore. It is the antimatter equivalent of the Green Lantern ring. Known weaknesses are the same as the Green Lantern ring. It requires regular charging and can be deactivated by–}

“Yeah, yeah, ten steps ahead of you,” Kyle muttered, and focused his energy on draining the ring from the hand of the semiconscious evil Guy.

“Who are you, Buddy?” Kyle asked. “Besides, I mean, being a mean-spirited jerk who looks like my friend, Guy?”

“I am Parallax,” he said. “I am the undoing of the Lanterns.”

“Oh yes? How so?”

“I am the Guardian of Qward.”

{The Yellow Ring is now empty,} Kyle's ring reported.

“Bye-bye, Mr. Undoing,” Kyle said, and he threw the golden-armored Parallax at the ground below.

A second later, picking up speed as he went, Parallax slammed into Warrior's back and the two crushed a few feet of concrete below them.

“Seven hells, Kyle!” Guy shouted. “You can't control the fall?”

“The Lantern controls nothing,” Parallax said as he stood again, surrounded by a yellow aura. “He sees only what I want him to see: He perceived the ring as the source of my power, when in fact I have no such limita--!”

He was cut off in mid-sentence by a blast of red-orange energy from behind. To Kyle's amazement, he saw a man who appeared to be John Stewart—his old boss?--wearing a semiarmored set of tights and flying through the air.

“There are a lot more guys in tights running around since Superman died,” Stewart said. “Who are you guys?”

“Let's do that later, Jerky,” Kyle said, scowling. “Wrap these guys up first.”

“Tool of the Controllers,” Parallax said in an accusatory tone. He motioned to Stewart and tossed him into the air.

“Tool,” Kyle said in a similarly disdainful voice, and smashed a giant green hammer down on top of Parallax. “I think--”

Dementor cut Kyle off by slashing into his ribs with an armored claw and a roar. “Out of the way, Lantern!” Dementor shouted. “I won't have the Vuldarians damaged!”

A cannon blast to the face from Warrior knocked Dementor to his knees as well.Stewart came flying back in, only to be knocked out of the sky by an errant blast from Kyle's ring that was intended for the now-recovering Parallax. Parallax gathered up Stewart and Kyle in a fiery net.

“The Oan legacy ends here,” Parallax growled. He reared back, and the constraints around Kyle and John tightened.

“This is what you get for being a crappy boss,” Kyle said to John.

“What?” John choked out, and it was impossible to tell whether his tone was a result of general shock or the tightening of Parallax's grip. A second later, though, the Green Lantern and his red-and-white clad comrade heard a wet thud, a clatter of metal and the fiery net around them dissipated. Kyle looked down to see Dementor on the ground in a pool of blood, and Parallax stumbling back to his feet. Blood caked the back of Parallax's head. Together as if on cue, John, Kyle, and Guy all blasted Parallax with everything they had. Evil Guy fell back to the ground, blood pouring from his ears, and when he didn't immediately recover he instead vanished in a puff of yellow light.

Kyle touched down on the ground gracefully, rubbing his knuckles. “Another day, I guess,” he grumbled. “So what's your story, Stewart?”

“How do you know who I am, kid?” John demanded.

“I asked first.”

John Stewart sighed. “I'm part of an interplanetary police force called the Darkstars. We serve the Controllers, who are a race of hyperintelligent and benevolent aliens. This costume I'm wearing allows me to survive in space, gives me flight, energy projection and a battery of other powers. You are...?”

Kyle ignored the question. “Warrior, what the heck did you do to break his concentration?”

Guy, his hands bloody up to the elbow, grinned the biggest grin Kyle had ever seen on any man. “I tore out Dementor's heart and then used one of my cannons to blast it into the clone-of-me's head.”

Stewart looked disgusted for a fleeting moment, but couldn't help laughing. Kyle and Guy were unabashed about finding the humor in it; they stood in the middle of a blood-soaked, decimated street where millions of dollars of property damage had just been caused in part by them, and laughed themselves half-sick. Unknown to the heroes, Dementor was already beginning to heal, and he stirred on the bloody ground behind them.

“So I saved your sorry little ass again,” Guy boasted. “I think that ring is mine!”

“No, Guy, it only works for me. Something about DNA,” Kyle said. “Sorry, it's mine.”

There was a flash of blinding green light, and I appeared before them, my hand outstretched and my voice stern and authoritative.

“Actually,” I told Kyle Rayner, “It's mine. And I want it back.”

Continued...