Green Lantern Corps. General. 082. If.
Title: Five Things That Never Happened To Kyle Rayner
Fandom:
Characters:
Prompt: IF - 082
Word Count: 3,370
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Five ways it didn’t go.
Author's Notes: Continuity ranges from Kyle’s first appearance as GL all the way through the Sinestro Corps War. No specific warnings.
1. Never Tell
Dear Kyle.
His things were in storage, his apartment empty. Of all the things Kyle had expected to find when returning from Oa, the loss of both his living space and his girlfriend was not among them.
I’m sorry it has to be this way, but I couldn’t just keep waiting for you to come home. While you were out there, playing space cop, I had the chance to be just me - not you and me. I’ve made a life for myself and moved on, and I didn’t even realize I was doing it. But knowing that, I couldn’t be here when - if you came back. I hope that someday we can be friends, but now I think it’s best if we don’t see each other for a while. -Jen
Only later, so very very much later, did he find out why she had left. A rift open in time and space, a random strike of lightning - he didn’t see until it was too late, but she was between him and it, and again someone he had loved was sacrificed on the altar of his survival. Her last words, powered by the remnants of energy he had once given her, were a plea to take care of her son - of their son. The shock was almost enough to cost him his survival in a war he’d never wanted to be a part of in the first place. He’d known she had a child, had known that the time frame was almost right, but had assumed that she’d fallen in love with someone else and that the asshole had just left her to raise the kid alone. He’d offered, once or twice, to help out, but she wouldn’t let him near the boy.
“How can I…” The energy she had returned to him was enough again to restore his abilities as Ion, enough to bring him to the threshold of godhood. That kind of strength was valuable in the war, valuable in a Green Lantern, and completely useless as a father. With this reasoning in mind, Kyle found himself standing before the Guardians and asking them to remove the power of Ion.
Nothing in his life could have prepared him for the depth of feeling he found for the child he now knew to be his own. He would have done anything to keep the boy safe and happy; he wouldn’t leave him as his own father had done. Kyle’s son - Jenny’s son - would know without a doubt that both of his parents loved him. Where risking his own life had been acceptable, it was suddenly impossible for Kyle to sentence his child to a life without both parents. The Torchbearer would pass from among the ranks of the Corps to become an ordinary man.
The Guardians, unhappy as they were, eventually agreed. Facing the rest of the Lanterns was more difficult, but when Hal demanded to know how Kyle could just walk away from his responsibilities, Kyle thought of a secret he had learned as Ion had been removed, and simply smiled at Hal, unapologetic.
“He’s my son.”
2. There But For the Grace…
“I’ve had it, Tyler. I’m outta here.” Between one split second and the next, Kyle lost all the patience he had for his friend. The latest episode of drunken idiocy in what was turning into a veritable string was more than he could handle. “You should think about going home, too.”
“Screw you,” Tyler said. Kyle turned on his heel and stalked out the front door. He’d wanted a breath of air, a moment away from the noise and the heat, but suddenly he couldn’t bear the thought of going back inside. As he walked away, he didn’t see the flash of green light behind the building. He didn’t see the flare of headlights, either, that skidded down the road far too quickly to stop in time. He felt the impact before he stopped seeing anything at all.
Vision returned slowly, at first overwhelmed with white, and then fading again before finally resolving into a concerned and very familiar face.
“Alex, what are you doing in my apartment?” he asked, or tried to. It came out sounding sort of mushy.
“You’re not in your apartment,” she answered, and something about her expression tugged at his memory.
“Hey, you dumped me last week.” That came out a little better. Not so rusty-sounding.
“Kyle, do you remember anything?”
There was a little nagging feeling that was telling him that he didn’t want to remember anything, and he was sort of relieved that he could answer with all honesty that he had no idea what she was talking about. Curiosity prompted by a vague but increasing sense of dread led him to ask exactly where he was and what she was doing there.
“The car,” Alex said, but Kyle still had no idea what she was talking about. “You went out. With Tyler. And when you walked out the front door, you walked straight into the path of an oncoming car. You’re lucky you’re not dead.”
It was at that point that it occurred to Kyle that he could not actually feel his toes, or much of anything else below the waist, nor could he move anything at all. Alex must have read his expression, because she suddenly started backpedaling.
“It’s not that bad, I mean, you’re going to be okay.” She was making that face, the one that said she was lying through her teeth and it was his fault. He hated that face.
“Don’t lie to me, Alex.” He discovered that he could move his right hand after all - it felt heavy and odd, but it looked normal enough and it reached up well enough to cup Alex’s cheek. “Please.” Alex pulled his hand away, holding it tightly.
“There are bone fragments lodged in your spine,” she said in a rush, as if hearing it more quickly would make it better somehow. “You might never walk again.”
If he hadn’t already been lying down, Kyle would have fallen. When the roaring in his ears ceased and he could see through the gray fog again, he stared at Alex. “You’re serious,” he said.
“Yes.” She bowed her head, still holding onto his hand as if it were some sort of lifeline.
“What else?” He had other injuries, broken bones and bits on the inside that weren’t quite where they should have been, but except for the shattered vertebrae, he’d gotten off pretty lightly. Not that it particularly felt like getting off lightly - the one time he apparently didn’t look before crossing the street and that was the day someone was speeding down a narrow road at two in the morning without paying attention to where they were going.
“Can I, um, have… can you leave me alone for a while?” He didn’t remember the accident, but he did remember Alex telling him the week before that they were finished. As glad as he was that she was here now, as much as he hated to cause the flash of hurt that slipped across her face before she forced another smile and told him to take as much time as he needed, he couldn’t look at her.
If there was anyone else in the room, he didn’t know and didn’t want to know. Using his right arm - the left was bound in a bulky cast and fixed so he couldn’t move it anyway - he pulled the pillow out from behind his head and used it to muffle the all-too-audible tears that wouldn’t stay in. Eventually he fell asleep with the pillow where it was and woke to clean sheets and a brighter ceiling.
A note was tucked into his good hand.
Kyle, it read. I’ll be back. I will always come back, as long as you need me.
A small flame of determination woke within, and he clung to it. Even without his legs, he still had his hands, and his eyes, and Alex. He had to believe that. He had to.
3. In Full Flood
This is it, this is the last moment. I have done all I can. I have tried to stop war, famine, disease, and hatred. I have attempted to create paradise on earth, and everywhere else. I have tried to give all the life I can see the means to propel itself to its highest potential. It has not been easy, and the road, although short by conventional standards, has been long as I have walked it.
I know that there are many who do not agree with the way I have chosen. I know that there are those who oppose me. Some of those now arrayed against me are those I respect. It is out of that respect that I have chosen to make my last act here. My last stand.
I am energy. I am Ion. My body, my physical body, holds the ties between my soul and this world, and it cannot take the strain. I cannot remain as I am and I cannot go back. I could never in good conscience make that decision - how could I turn my back on the fear and pain and suffering that I can see so clearly? No. This is the way it must be.
Clark is frowning, that twitch of the left eyebrow when he does something he wishes he didn’t have to, and Alan looks sorrowful. I regret the pain that I have caused and will continue to cause them both. They are surrounded by those I would have called friends, comrades, teammates. Don’t they know that they’re only still here because I wish it? Don’t they know that I could unmake them with a thought? But they would not be who they are if they didn’t at least try.
Someone is speaking now, asking me to stop, asking me to reconsider, appealing to my better nature, I suppose. I’m not quite sure who it is, because there is a sun about to go supernova due to a failed experiment on the part of the population depending on it for life. It’s very difficult to manipulate the wild energies of a star even under normal conditions, and this is much worse. At the same time, earthquakes ravage another world many parsecs away and a newly opened black hole threatens to destabilize a small corner of the galaxy. I am repairing all of this, and so I’m not quite sure who’s speaking. It just isn’t that important.
Finally, it comes. The unraveling, the thinning of the connection. The energy raging through me pours out and it is all I can do to direct it back to where it should go - back to Oa. I must finish what I am doing - it is increasingly more difficult to manipulate the world around me, but the black hole is closed, the sun is stable, and the earthquakes are quiescent again. Earth, my home, is as safe as I can make it. I know it’s selfish of me, but I want its continued survival more than anything else.
No longer can I feel the green fire flowing through my veins, no longer can I see the universe from a million different places. My manifestations melt away until I can only see my surroundings through one pair of eyes, only hear with one set of ears. The chill of winter bites into my bare flesh, the perfect sun at the utmost south of the earth bathing my skin. I breathe the air, feeling its harshness grate my lungs, and now I see only the sky.
Was I cold, only a moment ago? I feel warm now, the sun a blanket covering me from head to toe. It’s dark around the edges, and I want only to sleep. I haven’t slept in so long, I’ve forgotten how it feels. Like sliding down a long tunnel into nothing, I feel my eyes close and my heartbeat slow. This is…
4. Two As One
“Why am I here? Let me out! Please!”
The glass was a one-way mirror, and Hal Jordan knew that Kyle Rayner couldn’t see him from the other side. Still, Kyle kept looking at him and it was incredibly disconcerting.
“Isn’t there anything… to be done?” he asked.
Ganthet shook his head. “Nothing,” he said. “We had hoped removing Ion would restore his equilibrium, but it seems only to have made things worse.”
Very few people knew that Ion was an entity composed of energy, or that the Torchbearer had been its unknowing host not once but twice. Hal was also one of the very few who knew exactly what had happened to the Torchbearer - there had been rumors of destruction and insanity, a final four-sector swathe of devastation and Hal had found Kyle at the end of it. The ring had been unable to tell him exactly what was wrong with Kyle, and the Guardians were now saying they couldn’t help him either.
“The coming future will be darker for lack of the Torchbearer,” Ganthet said, and he seemed genuinely grieved. Hal could count on one hand the number of times he’d seen emotion from one of the little blue Guardians, but this time definitely qualified.
“Are you sure he has to stay in there?” Kyle didn’t seem dangerous, not really. Just frantic with what had to be memory loss and confusion at finding himself cooped up with no communication. It would make anyone upset.
“Watch,” Ganthet said softly. Hal didn’t want to - it was difficult to watch a friend suffer, and doubly difficult to see someone as capable and strong as Kyle reduced to pounding on a window in desperation. He was trying so hard to not watch as he stared straight at Kyle that he missed the actual moment of transformation - between one heartbeat and the next, Kyle had gone perfectly still. Green energy reminiscent of both the rings and the energy of Ion outlined his body. With a cool, calculated precision, Kyle set about trying to cut his way out of the cell. When that failed, he turned his focus towards creating as much havoc in his environment as he could. That there wasn’t much for him to destroy was cold comfort - the absolute lack of humanity in his eyes was chilling, and fearless or not, Hal shivered when Kyle turned to the window again and seemed to stare straight at him.
“Hal,” Kyle said, and Hal absolutely did not flinch. “Ha-al,” Kyle said again, drawing out the single syllable with a sing-song lilt that reminded Hal of Kyle’s Irish mother. “I know you put me in here. I know what you did to me. And if I ever find a way out, I will rip you to pieces.”
There was no doubt in Hal’s mind that Kyle meant exactly what he said.
“How is he - I thought you removed Ion,” he said.
“A remnant remains. It is not enough to cause great concern, but he cannot be held by conventional means.” Ganthet’s smile was sad, but none of the emotion reached his eyes this time. “We will care for him, Hal Jordan of Earth. We will always care for him, through the darkness of the coming future and the dawn beyond.”
“The dawn beyond,” Hal echoed. “Is -“
“I will let you know if anything about his condition alters,” Ganthet said. It was a blatant subject change, and Hal didn’t want to let him get away with it, but he’d been around the Guardians long enough to know when one of them absolutely would not budge.
“Thank you,” he said, although he wasn’t sure it was quite the correct phrase. The Guardians were responsible for Kyle, had catalyzed the energy that had made him Ion and broken him under the pressure. Kyle was the third, now, to break , after Sinestro and Hal himself.
Though the coming night would be darker without Kyle, Hal resolved that it would not be the blackest night. He would do whatever it took to make sure the Corps and the Earth survived, and when the crisis was over, he would find a way to help Kyle. There was no way he could just leave him, any more than Kyle could have left his body in the sun while his spirit was with the Spectre.
“Hang in there,” he said softly. Perhaps it was only coincidence, but as Hal spoke, Kyle’s rage increased and the window creaked under the strain of his assault. Then, as quickly as it had begun, it was over and the eyes of a bewildered lost child looked out from the face of a man.
“Hal?”
Fear had nothing to do with Hal’s retreat. Nothing.
5. Fear Itself
“Are you afraid yet, alley rat?”
I am not afraid.
“Are you frightened yet? Are you frightened of which one of your loved ones will perish next?”
I am not afraid.
“Perish because of your dedication to a group of Guardians who don’t even know what love is?”
I am not afraid.
“Are you afraid?”
I am not-
“Yes. Yes, you are.”
No.
“You are ready now… for Parallax.”
NO.
The impact nearly shatters his breast, the fear demon slamming towards his heart and failing to gain entry. Slimy yellow fingers wrap around his body, oozing across his skin as the demon nuzzles across his ribs. Its tongue flicks towards his heart, sinking ever so slightly beneath the skin.
I am not afraid. I am not afraid.
No matter what he is told, that those he loves have died because of him, that his family and friends will be hunted and killed, he will not feel fear. The legacy he honored for all those years alone, the legacy he has helped rebuild, the tradition and history he has always respected - he will not abandon it now. The words spoken to every other - you have the ability to overcome great fear - were never directed towards him. His only benediction was simply you will have to do.
He will not fail it now, not after all he has already done and been through. To fall now would set the sacrifices so many others have made (unwilling) on his behalf to naught.
I am not afraid.
The fear demon tears at his skin. He closes his eyes against the pain, and rips one of its many legs free. Without a ring, without a weapon, he has no hope. Stronger than hope, stronger than fear, determination gives him the strength to twist away from the demon over and over again. The blood runs freely across his skin and drips steadily downwards, unhindered by the demon’s clinging limbs. He thinks he can hear it screaming - let me in! - but he won’t give in. Too much rides on his success.
I am not afraid, and you will not use me to hurt my friends, my teammates, my loved ones. I am not afraid.
Needle-sharp teeth sink into his soft slick skin, their full length buried in his flesh. He screams, uncaring of who hears. Pain gives him something to cling to, a focus to clear his increasingly hazy thoughts, but there is nothing more he can do. The demon ravages his body as it cannot ravage his soul, and so his final fall is only that of flesh and blood and bone.
Later - much later - a trap set within the Central Battery will pull the other humans to Qward. They will be met with a sea of foes and no sign of their friend, fight as desperately as they will. The arrival of the Lost Lanterns, seeking Ion, will gain them enough of a breathing space to see what their opponents are leading them towards all along.
The huge stone battery, lit yellow from within, is waiting. It is deliberately and grotesquely splashed with red. Prominently, almost lovingly, displayed on its surface is the body of Kyle Rayner, beaten and broken. Behind it, a wild laugh rings of terror and despair, and the yellow flash of fear is briefly and blindingly bright.
FINIS
Nalanzu's Little Damn Table.
Fandom:
Characters:
Prompt: IF - 082
Word Count: 3,370
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Five ways it didn’t go.
Author's Notes: Continuity ranges from Kyle’s first appearance as GL all the way through the Sinestro Corps War. No specific warnings.
1. Never Tell
Dear Kyle.
His things were in storage, his apartment empty. Of all the things Kyle had expected to find when returning from Oa, the loss of both his living space and his girlfriend was not among them.
I’m sorry it has to be this way, but I couldn’t just keep waiting for you to come home. While you were out there, playing space cop, I had the chance to be just me - not you and me. I’ve made a life for myself and moved on, and I didn’t even realize I was doing it. But knowing that, I couldn’t be here when - if you came back. I hope that someday we can be friends, but now I think it’s best if we don’t see each other for a while. -Jen
Only later, so very very much later, did he find out why she had left. A rift open in time and space, a random strike of lightning - he didn’t see until it was too late, but she was between him and it, and again someone he had loved was sacrificed on the altar of his survival. Her last words, powered by the remnants of energy he had once given her, were a plea to take care of her son - of their son. The shock was almost enough to cost him his survival in a war he’d never wanted to be a part of in the first place. He’d known she had a child, had known that the time frame was almost right, but had assumed that she’d fallen in love with someone else and that the asshole had just left her to raise the kid alone. He’d offered, once or twice, to help out, but she wouldn’t let him near the boy.
“How can I…” The energy she had returned to him was enough again to restore his abilities as Ion, enough to bring him to the threshold of godhood. That kind of strength was valuable in the war, valuable in a Green Lantern, and completely useless as a father. With this reasoning in mind, Kyle found himself standing before the Guardians and asking them to remove the power of Ion.
Nothing in his life could have prepared him for the depth of feeling he found for the child he now knew to be his own. He would have done anything to keep the boy safe and happy; he wouldn’t leave him as his own father had done. Kyle’s son - Jenny’s son - would know without a doubt that both of his parents loved him. Where risking his own life had been acceptable, it was suddenly impossible for Kyle to sentence his child to a life without both parents. The Torchbearer would pass from among the ranks of the Corps to become an ordinary man.
The Guardians, unhappy as they were, eventually agreed. Facing the rest of the Lanterns was more difficult, but when Hal demanded to know how Kyle could just walk away from his responsibilities, Kyle thought of a secret he had learned as Ion had been removed, and simply smiled at Hal, unapologetic.
“He’s my son.”
2. There But For the Grace…
“I’ve had it, Tyler. I’m outta here.” Between one split second and the next, Kyle lost all the patience he had for his friend. The latest episode of drunken idiocy in what was turning into a veritable string was more than he could handle. “You should think about going home, too.”
“Screw you,” Tyler said. Kyle turned on his heel and stalked out the front door. He’d wanted a breath of air, a moment away from the noise and the heat, but suddenly he couldn’t bear the thought of going back inside. As he walked away, he didn’t see the flash of green light behind the building. He didn’t see the flare of headlights, either, that skidded down the road far too quickly to stop in time. He felt the impact before he stopped seeing anything at all.
Vision returned slowly, at first overwhelmed with white, and then fading again before finally resolving into a concerned and very familiar face.
“Alex, what are you doing in my apartment?” he asked, or tried to. It came out sounding sort of mushy.
“You’re not in your apartment,” she answered, and something about her expression tugged at his memory.
“Hey, you dumped me last week.” That came out a little better. Not so rusty-sounding.
“Kyle, do you remember anything?”
There was a little nagging feeling that was telling him that he didn’t want to remember anything, and he was sort of relieved that he could answer with all honesty that he had no idea what she was talking about. Curiosity prompted by a vague but increasing sense of dread led him to ask exactly where he was and what she was doing there.
“The car,” Alex said, but Kyle still had no idea what she was talking about. “You went out. With Tyler. And when you walked out the front door, you walked straight into the path of an oncoming car. You’re lucky you’re not dead.”
It was at that point that it occurred to Kyle that he could not actually feel his toes, or much of anything else below the waist, nor could he move anything at all. Alex must have read his expression, because she suddenly started backpedaling.
“It’s not that bad, I mean, you’re going to be okay.” She was making that face, the one that said she was lying through her teeth and it was his fault. He hated that face.
“Don’t lie to me, Alex.” He discovered that he could move his right hand after all - it felt heavy and odd, but it looked normal enough and it reached up well enough to cup Alex’s cheek. “Please.” Alex pulled his hand away, holding it tightly.
“There are bone fragments lodged in your spine,” she said in a rush, as if hearing it more quickly would make it better somehow. “You might never walk again.”
If he hadn’t already been lying down, Kyle would have fallen. When the roaring in his ears ceased and he could see through the gray fog again, he stared at Alex. “You’re serious,” he said.
“Yes.” She bowed her head, still holding onto his hand as if it were some sort of lifeline.
“What else?” He had other injuries, broken bones and bits on the inside that weren’t quite where they should have been, but except for the shattered vertebrae, he’d gotten off pretty lightly. Not that it particularly felt like getting off lightly - the one time he apparently didn’t look before crossing the street and that was the day someone was speeding down a narrow road at two in the morning without paying attention to where they were going.
“Can I, um, have… can you leave me alone for a while?” He didn’t remember the accident, but he did remember Alex telling him the week before that they were finished. As glad as he was that she was here now, as much as he hated to cause the flash of hurt that slipped across her face before she forced another smile and told him to take as much time as he needed, he couldn’t look at her.
If there was anyone else in the room, he didn’t know and didn’t want to know. Using his right arm - the left was bound in a bulky cast and fixed so he couldn’t move it anyway - he pulled the pillow out from behind his head and used it to muffle the all-too-audible tears that wouldn’t stay in. Eventually he fell asleep with the pillow where it was and woke to clean sheets and a brighter ceiling.
A note was tucked into his good hand.
Kyle, it read. I’ll be back. I will always come back, as long as you need me.
A small flame of determination woke within, and he clung to it. Even without his legs, he still had his hands, and his eyes, and Alex. He had to believe that. He had to.
3. In Full Flood
This is it, this is the last moment. I have done all I can. I have tried to stop war, famine, disease, and hatred. I have attempted to create paradise on earth, and everywhere else. I have tried to give all the life I can see the means to propel itself to its highest potential. It has not been easy, and the road, although short by conventional standards, has been long as I have walked it.
I know that there are many who do not agree with the way I have chosen. I know that there are those who oppose me. Some of those now arrayed against me are those I respect. It is out of that respect that I have chosen to make my last act here. My last stand.
I am energy. I am Ion. My body, my physical body, holds the ties between my soul and this world, and it cannot take the strain. I cannot remain as I am and I cannot go back. I could never in good conscience make that decision - how could I turn my back on the fear and pain and suffering that I can see so clearly? No. This is the way it must be.
Clark is frowning, that twitch of the left eyebrow when he does something he wishes he didn’t have to, and Alan looks sorrowful. I regret the pain that I have caused and will continue to cause them both. They are surrounded by those I would have called friends, comrades, teammates. Don’t they know that they’re only still here because I wish it? Don’t they know that I could unmake them with a thought? But they would not be who they are if they didn’t at least try.
Someone is speaking now, asking me to stop, asking me to reconsider, appealing to my better nature, I suppose. I’m not quite sure who it is, because there is a sun about to go supernova due to a failed experiment on the part of the population depending on it for life. It’s very difficult to manipulate the wild energies of a star even under normal conditions, and this is much worse. At the same time, earthquakes ravage another world many parsecs away and a newly opened black hole threatens to destabilize a small corner of the galaxy. I am repairing all of this, and so I’m not quite sure who’s speaking. It just isn’t that important.
Finally, it comes. The unraveling, the thinning of the connection. The energy raging through me pours out and it is all I can do to direct it back to where it should go - back to Oa. I must finish what I am doing - it is increasingly more difficult to manipulate the world around me, but the black hole is closed, the sun is stable, and the earthquakes are quiescent again. Earth, my home, is as safe as I can make it. I know it’s selfish of me, but I want its continued survival more than anything else.
No longer can I feel the green fire flowing through my veins, no longer can I see the universe from a million different places. My manifestations melt away until I can only see my surroundings through one pair of eyes, only hear with one set of ears. The chill of winter bites into my bare flesh, the perfect sun at the utmost south of the earth bathing my skin. I breathe the air, feeling its harshness grate my lungs, and now I see only the sky.
Was I cold, only a moment ago? I feel warm now, the sun a blanket covering me from head to toe. It’s dark around the edges, and I want only to sleep. I haven’t slept in so long, I’ve forgotten how it feels. Like sliding down a long tunnel into nothing, I feel my eyes close and my heartbeat slow. This is…
4. Two As One
“Why am I here? Let me out! Please!”
The glass was a one-way mirror, and Hal Jordan knew that Kyle Rayner couldn’t see him from the other side. Still, Kyle kept looking at him and it was incredibly disconcerting.
“Isn’t there anything… to be done?” he asked.
Ganthet shook his head. “Nothing,” he said. “We had hoped removing Ion would restore his equilibrium, but it seems only to have made things worse.”
Very few people knew that Ion was an entity composed of energy, or that the Torchbearer had been its unknowing host not once but twice. Hal was also one of the very few who knew exactly what had happened to the Torchbearer - there had been rumors of destruction and insanity, a final four-sector swathe of devastation and Hal had found Kyle at the end of it. The ring had been unable to tell him exactly what was wrong with Kyle, and the Guardians were now saying they couldn’t help him either.
“The coming future will be darker for lack of the Torchbearer,” Ganthet said, and he seemed genuinely grieved. Hal could count on one hand the number of times he’d seen emotion from one of the little blue Guardians, but this time definitely qualified.
“Are you sure he has to stay in there?” Kyle didn’t seem dangerous, not really. Just frantic with what had to be memory loss and confusion at finding himself cooped up with no communication. It would make anyone upset.
“Watch,” Ganthet said softly. Hal didn’t want to - it was difficult to watch a friend suffer, and doubly difficult to see someone as capable and strong as Kyle reduced to pounding on a window in desperation. He was trying so hard to not watch as he stared straight at Kyle that he missed the actual moment of transformation - between one heartbeat and the next, Kyle had gone perfectly still. Green energy reminiscent of both the rings and the energy of Ion outlined his body. With a cool, calculated precision, Kyle set about trying to cut his way out of the cell. When that failed, he turned his focus towards creating as much havoc in his environment as he could. That there wasn’t much for him to destroy was cold comfort - the absolute lack of humanity in his eyes was chilling, and fearless or not, Hal shivered when Kyle turned to the window again and seemed to stare straight at him.
“Hal,” Kyle said, and Hal absolutely did not flinch. “Ha-al,” Kyle said again, drawing out the single syllable with a sing-song lilt that reminded Hal of Kyle’s Irish mother. “I know you put me in here. I know what you did to me. And if I ever find a way out, I will rip you to pieces.”
There was no doubt in Hal’s mind that Kyle meant exactly what he said.
“How is he - I thought you removed Ion,” he said.
“A remnant remains. It is not enough to cause great concern, but he cannot be held by conventional means.” Ganthet’s smile was sad, but none of the emotion reached his eyes this time. “We will care for him, Hal Jordan of Earth. We will always care for him, through the darkness of the coming future and the dawn beyond.”
“The dawn beyond,” Hal echoed. “Is -“
“I will let you know if anything about his condition alters,” Ganthet said. It was a blatant subject change, and Hal didn’t want to let him get away with it, but he’d been around the Guardians long enough to know when one of them absolutely would not budge.
“Thank you,” he said, although he wasn’t sure it was quite the correct phrase. The Guardians were responsible for Kyle, had catalyzed the energy that had made him Ion and broken him under the pressure. Kyle was the third, now, to break , after Sinestro and Hal himself.
Though the coming night would be darker without Kyle, Hal resolved that it would not be the blackest night. He would do whatever it took to make sure the Corps and the Earth survived, and when the crisis was over, he would find a way to help Kyle. There was no way he could just leave him, any more than Kyle could have left his body in the sun while his spirit was with the Spectre.
“Hang in there,” he said softly. Perhaps it was only coincidence, but as Hal spoke, Kyle’s rage increased and the window creaked under the strain of his assault. Then, as quickly as it had begun, it was over and the eyes of a bewildered lost child looked out from the face of a man.
“Hal?”
Fear had nothing to do with Hal’s retreat. Nothing.
5. Fear Itself
“Are you afraid yet, alley rat?”
I am not afraid.
“Are you frightened yet? Are you frightened of which one of your loved ones will perish next?”
I am not afraid.
“Perish because of your dedication to a group of Guardians who don’t even know what love is?”
I am not afraid.
“Are you afraid?”
I am not-
“Yes. Yes, you are.”
No.
“You are ready now… for Parallax.”
NO.
The impact nearly shatters his breast, the fear demon slamming towards his heart and failing to gain entry. Slimy yellow fingers wrap around his body, oozing across his skin as the demon nuzzles across his ribs. Its tongue flicks towards his heart, sinking ever so slightly beneath the skin.
I am not afraid. I am not afraid.
No matter what he is told, that those he loves have died because of him, that his family and friends will be hunted and killed, he will not feel fear. The legacy he honored for all those years alone, the legacy he has helped rebuild, the tradition and history he has always respected - he will not abandon it now. The words spoken to every other - you have the ability to overcome great fear - were never directed towards him. His only benediction was simply you will have to do.
He will not fail it now, not after all he has already done and been through. To fall now would set the sacrifices so many others have made (unwilling) on his behalf to naught.
I am not afraid.
The fear demon tears at his skin. He closes his eyes against the pain, and rips one of its many legs free. Without a ring, without a weapon, he has no hope. Stronger than hope, stronger than fear, determination gives him the strength to twist away from the demon over and over again. The blood runs freely across his skin and drips steadily downwards, unhindered by the demon’s clinging limbs. He thinks he can hear it screaming - let me in! - but he won’t give in. Too much rides on his success.
I am not afraid, and you will not use me to hurt my friends, my teammates, my loved ones. I am not afraid.
Needle-sharp teeth sink into his soft slick skin, their full length buried in his flesh. He screams, uncaring of who hears. Pain gives him something to cling to, a focus to clear his increasingly hazy thoughts, but there is nothing more he can do. The demon ravages his body as it cannot ravage his soul, and so his final fall is only that of flesh and blood and bone.
Later - much later - a trap set within the Central Battery will pull the other humans to Qward. They will be met with a sea of foes and no sign of their friend, fight as desperately as they will. The arrival of the Lost Lanterns, seeking Ion, will gain them enough of a breathing space to see what their opponents are leading them towards all along.
The huge stone battery, lit yellow from within, is waiting. It is deliberately and grotesquely splashed with red. Prominently, almost lovingly, displayed on its surface is the body of Kyle Rayner, beaten and broken. Behind it, a wild laugh rings of terror and despair, and the yellow flash of fear is briefly and blindingly bright.
FINIS
Nalanzu's Little Damn Table.