Post by HoM on Aug 26, 2015 12:39:44 GMT -5
Previously, in GREEN LANTERN CORPS…
JOHN STEWART has seen a lot in his life, but if there’s one constant, its loyalty, a quality gained during his youth that galvanised during his time in the US Marine Corps.
During the events of SCARLET REIGN, JOHN’s two lives collided when an old friend, namely SENATOR BRADLEY ROTH, was caught up in the machinations of the villainous EVIL STAR, a psychotic intergalactic terrorist who triggered a cosmic event that led to the extinguishing of the Central Power Battery and the deaths of countless trillions across the galaxy. Whole planets died when their life-giving stars were extinguished by EVIL STAR’s actions, but thanks to KYLE RAYNER, untold legions more survived when he used the power of the WHITE LANTERN to reignite them.
Six months later and JOHN is still a man on a mission-- what happened to ROTH, and where is EVIL STAR? JOHN is about to learn that some secrets have been buried for a reason…
Welcome back to the ongoing adventures of the GREEN LANTERN CORPS!
John Stewart was dying. The bullet hole was in his chest, just below his ribs. He could feel the air wheeze out of his lungs but he couldn’t catch a breath to stem the tide of oxygen circling the drain. Punctured lung. Not long now.
“You dying over there, Builder?”
John’s eyes lazily rolled toward the source of the voice.
It was supposed to be a routine patrol. That was all. But then the IED detonated, the insurgents sprung their attack and his fellow marines were gone. Dead.
John was bleeding out far from home. Not the way he wanted to go. Never the way. Old and distinguished, grey hairs in his beard and a life well lived. A death well earned by living long and proper. Not like this.
“Hurt pretty, pretty bad, old man,” said John.
There was gunfire and all John could see was muzzle flare.
“You aren’t going to die. Medic’s not far. Just hold on. You hold on, we get out of here, you owe me a pint at O’Malley’s, you hearing me?”
“Can’t,” said John. “Can’t think.”
Corporal Bradley Roth grimaced at the sight in front of him. Blood on the sand, glistening in the desert sun. Blood on the uniform. Blood where it shouldn’t be.
“Shit. Guess we don’t have time to wait,” said Roth. He swung his rifle behind his back and grabbed John by the shoulders. “This is going to hurt like hell but it’s either that or the reaper, okay?”
“Wha?”
Roth picked Stewart up and slung him over his shoulder.
With gunfire blazing overhead, bullets whizzing past them, Roth began their retreat.
“I want to thank you for coming today, Green Lantern,” said the main FBI agent, as he led John Stewart and another down a well-lit corridor.
“Please, call me John,” said the Lantern. He’d been invited to the New York field office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation for reasons that had yet to be made clear. His ring ran defence protocols in the background, invisible to the naked eye, in case this was something more malicious than it appeared. Stewart learned never to go into a situation without coming up with an exit strategy first.
“That’s kinda why we called you in,” said the second agent. “Not ‘cause of your ring and all, but because of who you used to be.”
“How so?” said John.
“Back when you served, you knew Bradley Roth, right?” said the main agent.
“Senator Roth saved my life, it was, ah,” said John. “A shame I couldn’t return the favour.”
Roth approached Stewart to be part of his political campaign, but Stewart turned him down. It was a few moments after that when one of Evil Star’s starlings detonated John’s place of work and nearly killed everyone involved*.
When John returned to New York, he’d come to understand that Evil Star continued his murder spree, this time releasing a viral pathogen into the hospital Roth had been recuperating in. No survivors. Salaak had granted him permission to investigate, and Stewart had spent six months following leads in sector 2814, but with no luck.
“Yeah, I don’t know about that,” said the second FBI agent. “Thing is, the Evil Star pathogen story ain’t exactly true. In this day and age you gotta’ be careful about what the public hear, or there’s a mass panic. Here we are--”
The second agent opened a door and John entered.
“Good God,” said Stewart.
The room was full of crime scene photos, arranged around and giving anyone who entered a glimpse into a horror show. There was evidence all around, televisions set up streaming security camera footage. It looked like a monument to a ghastly event, set up to replay when the tapes reached their end.
“When we told you that Evil Star wiped the security camera footage, we lied. We’ve sat on it, unpicking it, constructing and reconstructing the narrative.”
“You lied to me?” said John. “To the families of the victims?”
“You’ll understand why in a moment, John,” said the first agent.
“Bradley Roth got up and killed every single person in that hospital,” said the second agent. “Your Senator Roth went a bit homicidal. Understatement, of course.”
John couldn’t understand. He’d been to the man’s funeral. Then it clicked. “My God. You’re covering it up to protect the government’s reputation.”
“A senator goes mad and kills over a hundred civilians? You bet your ass we’re going to cover it up,” said the second agent.
“It’s not like that,” said the first agent, shaking his head. “But the panic it would cause if this information leaked would be immense. The families of the deceased believe their loved ones died peacefully. Not like this--”
The agent gestured to a scene that played on a loop of a young man being torn into four by Evil Star’s Starling minions.
“Bradley Roth was a good man,” said John. “It couldn’t have been him.”
“Camera don’t lie,” said the second agent. “The videos show Roth waking up after his attack, and those creepy-crawling things scampering around the hospital and dragging them into the dining hall. What happens next it when it gets weird.”
The main agent motioned toward a screen that showed Bradley Roth suck the life out of the assembled men, women and children. Threads of ethereal light left their bodies and were absorbed into Roth. When he took his fill, they collapsed onto the ground, empty husks, some still twitching with the last drops of life slowly dissolving inside them.
“Those starlings are familiars of Evil Star,” said John. “They were there when my place of work was destroyed, when Roth and the rest were injured. It doesn’t make sense.”
“Does it make more sense than this horror show?” said the main agent.
“Godammit. I let you have the scene. You wiped it clean. My ring couldn’t pick up anything when you were done.”
“You need to understand our position--” said the first agent.
“And you’re not really in a position to dictate policy,” said the second.
John clenched his fist. “You should have told me all this six months ago,” said John. “I’ve wasted so much time.” He began to pace, but his attention was drawn to fragments of a metallic substance stuffed inside an evidence bag. His ring tingled in its presence, and he approached it slowly, scanning it covertly.
“Yeah, well, we didn’t need you then--” said the second agent.
“And you aren’t getting me now,” said John. “Thank you for the information.”
Stewart went intangible and shot through the ceiling of the FBI building and flew up until he hit the skies above.
Bradley Roth, a mass murderer? Evil Star? That wasn’t right. It couldn’t be.
Ring, what was with that substance in the evidence room?
<Unknown, but trace amounts detected elsewhere within city limits.> said the ring.
John’s ring pinged a location to him and he willed it to take him there. He shot through the skies like an emerald rocket, the citizens of Manhattan looking up with awe. He had seen men and women wearing t-shirts with the Green Lantern emblem emblazoned upon it over the last few weeks. Children wearing merchandise based around him.
If John were a cynical man, he would have sought out the people creating and distributing said paraphernalia and demanded a cut, but that wasn’t him.
Guy would, maybe.
“Hank, are you reading me?” said John.
There was a slight delay before a projection of Hank Henshaw’s head appeared in front of John.
“What do you need, John?” said Hank.
“FBI just told me that Bradley Roth didn’t die because of Evil Star. They’re pointing the finger and saying he was Evil Star. Can you look into his recent activities, speeches, that kind of thing, and see if anything pops up?”
“Of course,” said Hank. “I’ll get on that now.”
“Thanks, partner,” said John.
"I will not keep you for long, Lanterns," said the tentacle Protocol Lantern Shorm. The energy construct of his head was floating in front of Hank and John while they themselves floated above the Earth. "In the aftermath of recent events, I wish to inform you of your assignments."
Hank said nothing. John glanced at the former astronaut and then back at Shorm’s projection. "Thanks for taking the time, Shorm."
"John Stewart, you will remain as Green Lantern 2814.1, and Hank Henshaw, you are henceforth reactivated as Green Lantern 2814.2. You will be based in Sector 2814 for the foreseeable future."
"I had requested from Salaak that I work deep space--" said Hank. He caught himself before going any further. "Sorry. Thank you, Shorm."
"Hank Henshaw, your request was acknowledged and denied. You will do the most good in Sector 2814, a hot bed of trouble if there ever was one," said Shorm. "Your attention is required there and nowhere else."
"Thank you, Shorm," said Hank. He looked deflated.
Shorm nodded once, sharply, then vanished.
"You really don’t want to be back on Earth, do you," said John. It wasn’t a question.
"I’ll work my assignment," said Hank.
"Hank, you’ve been out of the loop for a while, I understand that, but you’ve got a chance to rebuild. Head back to Ferris Air, do what you love. You can’t wear the ring all the time," said John.
"I understand that, John. If you don’t mind, Sector 2814 is quite big, and I need to think about a few things. If you need me, just call."
"All right. Stay safe out there," said John.
Hank Henshaw nodded and headed out of Earth’s orbit, past the moon.
“Ah, ah god.” Every moment was fire and John couldn’t understand why. His chest hurt like all hell, and he couldn’t get past it. “God. Christ.”
“Sergeant Stewart? Can you hear me?”
His eyes locked onto the woman speaking. Things began to become clearer as his mind was elevated from the haze of darkness and pain.
“What’s, what’s going on?”
“You were shot. We patched you up and re-inflated the lung, but it’s still going to hurt like an absolute bitch, but now you’re awake we can begin pain management, do you understand me?”
The doctor had hard eyes but she was trying. He could hear a helicopter outside, roaring up a storm of dust and sand.
“Where’s Roth?”
“Corporal Roth was shot too, but don’t worry he’s all right, he’s been airlifted. Your ride is here, we’re going to get you airlifted to home base, get you back up to full speed.”
Stewart’s head lolled back against the stretcher. “Auuughhh.”
“That’s what I want to hear. You’re going home, soldier. You’re damn lucky to be alive.”
Not lucky. Roth didn’t begin in luck. No. He’d been saved by a man, and he now owed that man his life. A debt Stewart full intended to repay.
John had his aura pulsating, ready for anything. He had phased beneath the bustling streets and was now entering a large, artificial cavern filled with debris and broken technology. He glanced around. There was no movement.
John wasn’t in the mood for surprises. He extended out his aura so that every shadow, every nook and every cranny was illuminated. In the darkness, gangly limbed things jerked and cackled.
Starlings.
John thought about tracking their every location, about entombing them in emerald spheres. He thought about it and it happened. Dozens of globes appeared and coalesced in the centre of the chamber. Dozens of Starlings.
“Where is Evil Star?” said John.
They skittered and laughed. Beady little eyes darted around the room.
Anger bubbled up inside John. He didn’t like the feeling. “Where is Bradley Roth?”
No response. John’s ring scanned the creatures, and found that the creatures had no physiological function that would allow them to speak.
Typical.
<Biochemical agents detected within the immediate area,> said his ring. <Match mutagenic compound that triggered the metamorphosis of human subjects into plant-hybrids.*>
John looked over to the shattered remains of a lab area and his ring scanned the broken shards of glass and spilt chemicals. Coloured shades had stained the walls and floor. It had been a while since the explosion that ravaged the underground lair had occurred, but the effects were still obvious.
<Chemicals are inert, but match recorded signatures.>
Evil Star was behind the Solomon Grundy toxin?
<95% probability of that being the case,> said his ring.
Add another offence to his sheet, said John.
John turned his attention back to the Starlings. They were unable to speak?
That was fine, he didn’t need their mouths. Just their eyes.
John plucked one of the Starlings from the sphere and his ring shot light between his ears, so that his eyes lit up green. Tiny, black brain cells were being examined at lightning speeds. The Starling shrieked, confused, but then when the process continued, it grew bored of its panic. It hung, suspended by light, in the middle of the room, slapping its feet together.
John found the memory he was looking for and began to replay it, a construct swirling from the recollection.
From one of the nooks in the wall, the Starling had watched its master re-enter the lair. The view was distorted, like the recording was from a fish-eye lens. A side-effect of the Starling’s lack of cognitive ability.
The voices were distorted but John’s ring attempted to stabilise them. The volumes shifted in pitch and tenor as the Starling that had been listening moved around the room to get a better view.
"I never like pushing my luck. And your face was causing me so much discomfort, Senator."
The Starling’s eyes had darted from Evil Star to a cage on the far side of the room. Inside the cage was a man that appeared to be Bradley Roth. He was curled up and John had to enhance the construct to get a better look at him, but he was still blurry, still somewhat out of focus. The Starling had blinked and Bradley became clearer.
His once thick, black hair was now grey and thinning. His skin was creased and crumped, like a battered old book. John could hear the man wheeze as he spoke.
"Yuh you'll never get ah away with this, you buh bastard..."
"I already have, I wore your face, I took your youth to fuel my own, and with your face on my face, I stole the youth of every single man, woman and child in that insipid hospital John Stewart took me to. How wonderful. You're the monster, Roth. You're the villain."
John paused the reconstruction.
That was it. The admission of guilt. Roth was innocent, but would the police accept an emerald transmission from the brain of a barely cognitive familiar to a cosmic super villain? It seemed to insane to be true. John couldn’t allow Roth to be slandered as a mass murderer. He owed his friend that and more.
John continued with the reconstruction and found the focus now on Roth. "Juh John?"
John felt his heart drop.
"Yes, your old friend! Did you know he's now a Green Lantern?"
Roth seemed to double in size. The Starling had crawled closer to the cage. With one final, resounding act of defiance, Bradley grabbed the bars of the cage and levelled his stare at Evil Star.
"Huh he'll stop you.”
John watched the rest of the reconstruction in silence. He saw Evil Star activate a device built from cargo cult Oan and Apokoliptikan technology. He saw the explosion that reduced Bradley Roth to ash, and then that was it.
The Starling had run away when the first wave of energy decimated its brethren, finding a nook in the wall it could cower in for the duration of the incident.
John knelt down by the patch of scorched concrete that had once been Bradley Roth. It was almost laughable, that after they had fought through, the skirmishes, the wars, the bar fights, that it came down to this.
“Brad, I’m sorry,” said John. He knelt down and brushed his fingers across the floor. “You saved my life and I couldn’t save yours. I’m so sorry.”
John’s ring pulled a phone number from the ether and dialled it. “This is John Stewart. Yu wanted my help so here it is. I’m uploading some evidence to the FBI servers that you’ll want to see. It should clear Senator Roth of any wrong-doing. Evil Star is still out there and I’m going to bring him in.”
John now had to track down Evil Star. There was no trace of him after the explosion that killed Roth.
Where to now?
“Hank, you got anything for me?” said John.
Henshaw’s face appeared in front of John, projected from wherever Hank was and channelled through John’s ring. "Have you ever listened to Roth’s speeches? Check this one out--"Hank sent a construct through to John’s ring that opened up to reveal footage of Roth at a rally.
“Something is wrong with the world if we continue to let these ‘illegal aliens’ run rampant across our land, over our borders; the alien threat, one from without emerging within, it’s such a real problem that needs to be recognised. We have a problem with immigration, and we try our best to fix that, but the parallels to that and this are so real, so tangible; aliens come to Earth. Aliens settle on Earth. Aliens lead to more aliens leads to disputes and wars and we’re caught in the middle. That can’t do, not at all. The rights of humanity must be heard. We’re being threatened by a force that can destroy us without a thought for our own safety. Someone must speak out against them.”
“Brad was a passionate man,” said John. “You got anything that might link Roth to Evil Star?”
"Nothing so far, I’m afraid."
“I appreciate you doing the legwork,” said John. He watched Hank’s expression shift. “Something else on your mind?”
"There’s passion and there’s zealotry, John. After Mongul’s attack on Coast City, Roth went on to organise a number of rallies demanding that there be more control over alien presences on Earth. He used Coast City as a direct example of the need for better regulation*”
“You think the man was wrong?” said John. “Mongul obliterated a city and killed you. He sicced Lobo on Guy.* Now we have Evil Star running around slaughtering innocents. I can’t help but think the man had a point.”
"Evil Star and Bradley Roth are the same person," said Hank. "All the evidence points to that."
“I can’t believe that, Hank. I wont believe that.”
"I’ll back your play 100%, and I’ll keep my distance until you’re done with your investigation, but don’t hesitate to call me in if you need me," said Hank. "In the meantime, I’m going to look into some odd readings my ring’s picked up*. Keep me in the loop, all right?"
“Same to you,” said John.
"Roger," said Hank. His face vanished from sight, the emerald energy dissipating back into John’s ring.
<Green Lantern 2814.1, the energy signature and profile of the criminal designated ‘’Evil Star’ matches a cold case in Sector 2814.>
The voice from the ring wasn’t Hank Henshaw’s. The accent was foreign but John couldn’t place exactly how foreign, and he’d been based all over the world. Alien then, translated through the ring’s circuits. But who?
<Please proceed to the co-ordinates I have uploaded to your ring. More information to follow on arrival.>
“Who is this?” said John.
<Sector co-ordinates plotted, optimal route calculated. Proceed?>
Hank Henshaw’s voice had returned. Whoever had transmitted through his ring was now offline.
Ring, I want to know who that was.
<Data unavailable. No further information available until arrival at co-ordinates. Proceed?>
A mystery then. He programmed a message to send if anything went wrong to Hank, wherever he was, and another two to the NYPD and STAR Labs Manhattan. You can’t just leave an underground lair to gather dust. There would be decommissioning. Investigation. Evidence gathering.
With that all done, John prepped his ring.
<Ring charge at 95%>
Happy to continue, John launched himself up and began the sojourn into space. As soon as he was out of range of Earth, he hit subluminal and he allowed his ring to place him stasis for the journey to conserve energy.
<You are now entering the Auron space system,> said his ring. <Journey time three hours and fifty four minutes.>
John’s eyes opened and the subluminal tunnel faded away. The planet ahead of him resembled Earth, but with five rings encircling it. John’s mind wandered to images of atoms, swirling in the infinitesimal spaces beyond human perception.
In the distance, the Sun popped and shuddered, as light seeped from one side of it, a slow, gaping wound in the heart of a star bleeding out solar energy.
Ring, what’s happening to the Sun?
<Ring detects space time deformation. Black hole present. Keep a safe distance // warnings activated // planet below will be caught in gravitational wake within the next 48 hours.>
There’s a time limit on this investigation then, thought John.
<Thank you for coming, Green Lantern 2814.1, this cold case has been on the books for some time now,> said the voice in his ring.
"Who are you?"
<I am Protocol Lantern Dranz. As Protocol Lantern, my duties include the management of information pertaining to open investigations, as well as sensitive information.>
"Protocol Lantern? Shorm is Protocol Lantern."
<I am recording this interactive construct // calculating // one thousand years, one month, thirteen days, four hours, six minutes // prior to our current conversation. I have uploaded my consciousness to the construct in an effort to convey the nature of this incident to you.>
John had never heard of such a process. But the rings retained the characteristics and voice of their previous bearer, that was standard practice, and Sinestro had been demonstrating some previously hidden features of the power ring since his return to the Green Lantern Corps, so maybe there was more the ring could do that John wasn’t yet aware of? He would have to ask Sinestro later.
One thousand years, one month, thirteen days, four hours, six minutes?
"Ring, the cosmic blackout event that shut down all power rings*, how long ago did that take place specifically?*"
<One month, thirteen days, four hours, six minutes ago.>
A thousand years to the day that Auron came onto Dranz’s books. That was it then, Evil Star had been the one to trigger the disaster that extinguished suns and sucked the life out of every power ring in the galaxy. Billions had died, and John would level that charge at Evil Star’s feet.
Salaak had diverted a majority of the Corps' manpower to help in the reconstruction and support of the societies struck hardest by the event, but they were already stretched so thin.
"Ring, upload these findings to the Book of Oa, Salaak needs to know immediately,” said John.
<Green Lantern 2814.1, are you ready for us to continue?> said former Protocol Lantern Dranz.
John looked down at the planet below. "What does Evil Star have to do with Auron?”
A construct swirled out from John’s ring and took shape in front of him. The shape wasn’t humanoid in any sense of the world. It was an abstract number of coalescing angles, and beneath the hard angles was a secondary system of shapes resembling a nervous system. Little sparks of light flowed from the bottom of the shape and around the angles, toward the Green Lantern power ring on what appeared to be a limb.
John couldn’t be sure.
<Auron was once one of the most prosperous, scientifically-minded planets in the whole of the universe.>
The shape that must have been Dranz headed down toward the surface of the planet, and John followed.
<But it was struck by a great plague. Millions died. All of their science, all of their advances in medicine and they couldn’t halt its progression through their cities.>
They landed in the middle of a clearing in the middle of a grand, sweeping forest. John looked down at his foot and saw traces of concrete along the ground.
The Dranz construct gestured with his arm and John’s ring projected the true sight of Auron’s capitol city onto the lush forest tapestry. Tall spires surrounded by buzzing blue light, hover-crafts shuttling to and from smaller sub-stations. Humanoid constructs began to pass them by, going about their day.
The true face of Auron.
<We’re standing in the middle of Auron’s capitol, Aurondon Shannar. This is where the plague originated.>
“What caused it?” said John.
<The plague was genetically bonded to the DNA of the Auron people. They could not escape it, but they knew they were the only victims it could infect. They quarantined the planet, and all satellite colonies were ordered to never return here.>
“Genetically-bonded? So man-made? It was biochemical warfare?”
<Lab recordings suggest an accident caused the outbreak,> said Dranz. <Supposition, of course. Transmissions do not tell the full story. Regardless, Auron decreed that the Green Lantern Corps were not to interfere with their world’s crisis, even if it meant their deaths.>
“That’s mad,” said John. “God. A scientist did this? Was it Evil Star?”
<Unknown, facial recognition software does not confirm that,> said Dranz. <Sufficed to say, the Auron ruling science council focused all their energies on finding a cure.>
The projection changed, and Dranz led John up, into the sky, toward the highest spire. They went intangible, pushed through the foliage, and entered a large complex that peaked up through the clouds.
The emerald projection faded and John saw that the interior of the complex was a laboratory, preserved after all the centuries it had been abandoned.
<A lone scientist directed his previous research into the distribution of energies for the sake of prolonging the lives of the people into the search for a cure,> said Dranz.
A construct moved through the lab. He was a small man, a visor orbiting his head and a long lab coat fluttered behind him as he went about his work.
<Test subjects were required for the progression of the experiments. A decree was put forward by the science council for the use of inmates serving life sentences in the prisons,> said Dranz. <In this time, the society became more insular, in the hopes of preventing progression of the plague. Automated systems were increased, and oversight became minimal.>
“Living test subjects? This is sounding more and more like a horror show,” said John.
<The Guardians of the Universe agreed with that assessment, and sent Sector 2814’s Green Lantern, a medical genius in his own right, to assist with theeeeee>
Dranz’s construct began to fade, and the plateau of moving figures that John’s ring had been projecting vanished with him.
“Don’t you think that was boring?”
John sent finder beams into the dark. They found their target and illuminated the area, revealing a man clad in black and purple, a long cape twinkling with stars rolling down his shoulders. He wore a mask, but the eye slits were charred, and there was scar tissue around his eyelids.
Evil Star smiled and licked his lips.
“Hands on your head,” said John. “One warning.”
The Green Lantern had levelled his ring at the villain, ready for anything.
Evil Star laughed. “I came here six months ago to collect myself after the trauma I experienced back on Earth. You can’t imagine what I went through.”
John’s ring erupted with concentrated energy, his willpower directly behind it but instead of it shooting outwards with destruction fury, it flowed directly into Evil Star’s hand.
The sphere of light coalesced above Evil Star’s palm, and the villain’s smile widened.
“You can’t imagine what I went through,” said Evil Star. “Would have been a time that sitting in the dark, as I have these past few months, would drain my Star Band, keeping me from doing all the marvellous things I was born to do.”
Evil Star threw the energy back at John. The impact shocked John, sparks of emerald light riveting through his protective aura, and he was thrown from the lab into the cool Auron air outside.
Evil Star followed and his cape fluttered as he floated high above the ground.
“That time is past,” said Evil Star. “I have become so much more since I saw the light.”
Without a word, John sent his ring beneath the surface of the world and found the foundations of the building they had just been inside. He thought about the foundations crumbling, about capturing the building before it toppled, then redirecting it down upon them both. As he thought about it, it happened, and the tallest building on Auron was driven down toward Evil Star.
John’s aura throbbed as tonnes of concrete, metal and more slammed down all around him. He held his ground, better to stay small and stay strong than try and zip around or through the debris. Once the collapse was complete he surged upwards, to the surface, and saw what his imagination had wrought. The destruction he had caused.
Evil Star was nowhere to be seen.
It’s never that easy, thought John.
A purple energy construct grabbed John and dragged him to the ground. The construct was flowing from Evil Star’s arm, an extension of his own being.
<Save us, Green Lantern, please, save us.>
John didn’t know where the voices were coming from, but at this point in time he didn’t have the time care.
Evil Star was laughing as the construct he had projected from his hand returned to his flesh.
“I no longer seek power, I am power,” said Evil Star. “I absorb whatever you throw at me and I take it inside myself. Every blast, every construct, every stray thought made into reality, it empowers me like nothing else before.”
John understood two things Evil Star was saying. He was infinitely more powerful than a Green Lantern, and he was insane. The power he threw shook the planet, and cracks formed on the surface of the ruined, overgrown city they battled in.
What could John do?
Ring, redirect all power into altering this planet’s orbit. Take us as close to the black hole as possible, thought John. Then keep going. Keep the planet together so the stresses don’t tear it apart.
“They whisper to me, these creatures I take into my being, they beg for release,” said Evil Star. “What are their names? Oh, shall I let them tell you?”
The madman opened his mouth, and purple, glowing fingers attempted to claw their way out from his throat. His head stretched and grew, to accommodate the thing that tried desperately to escape his body, until John could see the creature’s face.
<I just want to protect love,> hissed the Predator.
Evil Star swallowed and laughed, the Predator being absorbed back down into his body.
“I’m like a battery,” said Evil Star. “I take everything you throw and I eat it all up, then it becomes part of me.”
Evil Star had his back to the Sun as the last remnants of its light were eaten by the black hole.
“I used to be just like you,” said Evil Star. “So optimistic. So brave. But when I saw what happened to these people, on this blight of a planet all those centuries ago, I knew enough was enough.”
“You used to be a Green Lantern,” said John. He could feel sweat dribble down the back of his head. His ring hand was shaking as he concentrated on holding the world together and sending it to it’sits doom.
“Ah, you guessed the end to Dranz’s story, that’s nice for you,” said Evil Star.
“You failed in your duty, so you decided to turn on the Corps? On the universe?”
Evil Star swatted John across the floor and the entire world shook violently as the Green Lantern’s concentration wavered. John coughed blood, his protective aura at a low point considering the amount of power he was shovelling into the act of moving a planet.
“I did not turn my back on the universe, I just decided to look at it from a different angle,” said Evil Star. “I saw the benefits of the Auron scientist’s experiments, even if his methods were vile. I put a stop to them, but he decided that one last gasp toward immortality was worth defying the Green Lantern Corps. He activated the machine, but was too close. He died in the blast that stole the lives of every single surviving Auron, and deposited their souls inside me.”
Evil Star opened his arms wide and thousands of energy projections of men, women and children shot toward Stewart. Every single person the villain had murdered across a thousand years flooded out of his body, their appearance streaked purple and green.
John rolled into a ditch to dodge the first wave of constructs, and then used his ring to dig into the ground, sealing himself up so he couldn’t be found, protected only by his aura.
Dozens of hands found him, and dragged him up. They scratched and clawed at him, Evil Star laughing all the while. Their attacks began to lessen, and John opened his eyes to see the projections be dragged away from him, back toward Evil Star.
Stewart could feel his own body by pulled forward too, as the gravity of the planet began to change massively.
Evil Star finally turned around, and saw the hole in space that John Stewart was pushing them toward. He turned back to face John, who then threw a large layer of the planet’s crust directly at Evil Star’s face, sending him flying up into orbit, and toward the black sun.
John followed the villain, sending chunks of debris at the former-Green-Lantern-turned-Evil-Star. He didn’t let the man get a word in, didn’t let him focus the power he had within his grasp. John didn’t both with energy constructs, knowing that he’d simply be giving Evil Star more ammunition to throw back at him, but he was tearing Auron to shreds with his power ring, using the ghost world to barrage his opponent.
“Why do you keep FIGHTING,” screamed Evil Star, as the man cut swathes through the debris coming toward him, swirling swords of green and purple energy flickering around his hands as John threw a dying world at him.
“Because you’re still standing,” said John, as the planet finally gave up the ghost and detonated, a blinding white light engulfing his senses before he could do anything else.
Debris either atomised in the explosion or was dragged immediately into the black hole, and John fought past the concussive effects of the detonation to make sure Evil Star didn’t get away. His ring was dying, but if he was able to push the villain into the black hole, then he could pull back, regroup, get a signal out to the rest of the Corps to make sure the threat was finally put to bed.
John could finally avenge the loss of Bradley Roth.
As the white streaks before his eyes were blinked away, John finally saw Evil Star.
The man with him caused John’s heart to drop.
“It looks like you could use a hand, Green Lantern,” said the pale, yellow-skinned half-man that floated in front of the black hole, gripping the comatose Evil Star’s throat in his left hand.
“Not from the likes of you, Parallax,” said John.
Parallax. The first Green Lantern. The creature who ravaged Oa and killed countless Guardians of the Universe before they managed to take him down. He re-emerged thousands of years later, caused trouble for Hal Jordan before vanishing into the shadows of the universe. Last seen during the Red Lantern war in Sector 0, responsible for the death of every living thing in Sector 666*.
Parallax was a raving lunatic who thrived on chaos, capable of unleashing power of a scale John could barely fathom. And now he was here, with Evil Star in his clutches. A smile on his face.
John’s ring was nearly dead, the amount of power required to survive so close to the black hole would deplete his ring’s charge in no time at all, and now the greatest threat to the Green Lantern Corps was floating before him, a sadistic smile framing his razor sharp teeth.
“You’re not even going to beg for your life?” said Parallax. He levelled his right hand in a fist in John’s direction, golden energy crackling around his knuckles. “You know who I am, what I’m capable of.”
“So why bother begging?” said John.
Parallax smiled. “Oh, I like you. Would be a shame--” The energy crackle flitted in the space between the two men, and John was gripped by a hard energy garrotte around his neck. “--To snuff you out. But I’ll tell you what, I’ll tell you this, I hate your kind more than anything in this universe. I hate you and I hate that I haven’t wiped the emerald scourge of the corps from the face of the galaxy yet. But then I started thinking about everything I could do to ruin your lives, and I had an epiphany.”
John choked, his ring fluctuating, his protective aura beginning to fade. Behind Parallax, the black hole flickered a burning, coalescing orange, as if it had caught alight. The black hole swirled and began to bright like an inferno in the darkness of space.
“I’m going to weaponise this universe against you,” said Parallax. “Every threat and every horror, I will find, I will nurture, and I will unleash a thousand-fold on your home worlds, on Oa, on every single emerald soul that wields a ring.” The monster drew John closer to himself, and then removed the choking construct that held John tight. “Do you know why I’m telling you all this?”
John summoned the last iota of power in his ring and roared as the blade construct he generated sliced through Parallax’s right arm, causing the monstrous begin to shriek in pain.
That was it-- before John could take advantage of this moment and recharge his ring, Parallax sent a catastrophic burst of energy at him, throwing him backwards into the burning hole in the universe behind him.
John felt the universe stretch and pulse around him as he was caught in the event horizon of the no-longer-black hole.
Everything ran rampant around him, space and time no longer made sense, and as his ring died--
“You’re not dying today, John,” said Stewart, a defiant statement to himself as everything twisted around him.
It wasn’t his time. He’d survived wars on Earth, in space. Invasions, too. Hell, he’d died on Oa, only to be saved by Henshaw and Sinestro. A black hole wouldn’t stop him. It couldn’t. What did he have left? The dying embers of a ring charge, and his willpower. And a belief in the fact that today wasn’t his day to die.
“Get. Me. Out of here! ”
An emerald chain shot out the swirling space-time event he was caught inside, and even though the act should have felt like picking a lock with a piece of spaghetti, the construct held, locked hard with the outside universe. John looked behind him, and saw fragments of reality run like scenes playing on a battered VHS player.
Even as the chain wrenched him back into the universe proper, he saw the Guardians of the Universe forge the first power ring, and the un-mutated form of Parallax gratefully receive the honour of becoming the first Green Lantern.
Oa burned as Parallax ran rampant, rage gripping his heart after the destruction of his own people. The last of his kind. Green Lantern no more.
Events accelerated. A sobbing, mentally broken Green Lantern not in control of his actions as he destroyed the Central Power Battery to further the cause of Darkseid’s Apokolips Imperative. Leaving a powerless corps in ruins.
Events accelerated. Kyle Rayner-- Ion-- sacrificed his life to reignite the Central Power Battery and imprison the rogue Guardian known as Krona, giving the newly reborn Green Lantern Corps a chance to finally turn the tide against the Manhunter hordes who conquered Oa, their rings recharged at long last.
Events accelerated. The Guardians of the Universe left this plane of existence with their Zamoran counterparts, leaving the Green Lantern Corps to govern themselves.
Events accelerated. More threats rose against the Green Lantern Corps and the universe. Red Lanterns-- harbingers of rage-- arrived from a parallel universe and nearly destroyed everything the Corps had built. The Star Sapphire Corps-- Love Lanterns-- joined forces with the reluctant Green Lanterns to ensure the sanctity of the galaxy.
Events accelerated beyond this moment in time--
Parallax presided over a legion of monsters, theirs hearts burning, the chaos they were capable of unleashing palpable. Their laughter and screams of insanity were a battle cry. Worlds wept as they approached.
A mechanical monstrosity roamed the stars, bigger than the worlds it devoured, and demons emerged from the ashes, terrors prepared to tear apart sectors of space.
A black-clad man wielded a ring of immense power, spreading his evil across the universe. His face was familiar, human, but John’s mind couldn’t comprehend his identity.
The fiery wall that separated the Red Lantern Corps and their adopted home sector of 666 dropped, and Atrocitus declared war against the galaxy. Another corps, another reason to take up arms.
Yellow rings found bearers across the galaxy, a new breed of terror taking root even as the rest of the universe suffered at the mounting threats that overwhelmed them.
A flaming cerulean light from the beginning of time emerged from the forbidden zones of the universe and headed toward Earth, its appearance a final act of vengeance struck from a being long dead.
Crackling scythes cut through space, and sentinels patrolled the galaxy, the dead rings of dead Green Lanterns hanging around their necks as they bought peace to their realms--
Without any warning and through one sheer act of willpower unlike anything the universe had ever witnessed, John Stewart emerged from the black hole, Auron now a debris field, no sign of Parallax or Evil Star, the black hole no longer on fire. John pulled his power battery from its pocket dimension and recharged before his ring died for good.
What had John just seen? The past, the present, and then, what, potential futures? Glimpses like tea leaves, something for John to interpret, assign meaning...
John Stewart headed to Sector 0, to Oa, his mind heavy with everything he had witnessed. This wasn’t something he could sit on, and he knew that if any of what he saw was to happen, then the universe would suffer. He pushed hard on his ring, and shot into the slipstreams the Corps used to travel the universe…
Evil Star felt the tubes and wires moving around under his skin. There was no discomfort, just the knowledge that there was something inside him, something more than the cosmic forces he attracted and stored inside his being.
“Hello,” said Parallax, looking down at the bound form of Evil Star.
“Whaaaat? ” said Evil Star, his words falling sluggishly from his lips.
“I can see what you are, and the potential you hold within you,” said Parallax. “You are capable of attracting and storing power sources into your being. Using that power for your own agenda. A living power battery. A wonder. Just like Kyle Rayner.”
“Whaaaat haaaave youuuu dooone? ”
“Simple, really,” said Parallax. “I can’t let you run around unchecked in the universe. Simple as. You might jeopardise my work. I’m building my own army, you see. Igniting madness and using those fires as a weapon against the peaceful reign of the Green Lantern Corps. So, until I find a reason for you to be in existence, I’m going to put you to sleep. Let you rest.”
Evil Star blinked, even as his vision began to blur. He saw the mirrored surface above his body, even his body looked completely foreign to him. There were tubes pushing themselves into every part of his exposed flesh, wires feeding in around the small, circular wounds each tube had inflicted on entry. His chest was open and he saw his heart, or where his heart should have been. Instead he saw lights coalesce together, swirling like oil and water.
“Sleep well, Evil Star,” said Parallax. “There’ll be a place for you in what comes next.”
“Sleeeeeep,” said Evil Star. “That sooooundssss niiiceeee--”
NEXT ISSUE: Guy Gardner investigate a mysterious distress beacon from an abandoned colony deep in space, while Hank Henshaw is confronted by the man who engineered the death of his crew back during his days as an astronaut-- none other than the recently exonerated Lex Luthor. What happens when Hank is pushed even further toward the edge than ever before? FIND OUT NEXT MONTH!
JOHN STEWART has seen a lot in his life, but if there’s one constant, its loyalty, a quality gained during his youth that galvanised during his time in the US Marine Corps.
During the events of SCARLET REIGN, JOHN’s two lives collided when an old friend, namely SENATOR BRADLEY ROTH, was caught up in the machinations of the villainous EVIL STAR, a psychotic intergalactic terrorist who triggered a cosmic event that led to the extinguishing of the Central Power Battery and the deaths of countless trillions across the galaxy. Whole planets died when their life-giving stars were extinguished by EVIL STAR’s actions, but thanks to KYLE RAYNER, untold legions more survived when he used the power of the WHITE LANTERN to reignite them.
Six months later and JOHN is still a man on a mission-- what happened to ROTH, and where is EVIL STAR? JOHN is about to learn that some secrets have been buried for a reason…
Welcome back to the ongoing adventures of the GREEN LANTERN CORPS!
The following story takes place parallel to GREEN LANTERN CORPS #52…
TEN YEARS AGO:
John Stewart was dying. The bullet hole was in his chest, just below his ribs. He could feel the air wheeze out of his lungs but he couldn’t catch a breath to stem the tide of oxygen circling the drain. Punctured lung. Not long now.
“You dying over there, Builder?”
John’s eyes lazily rolled toward the source of the voice.
It was supposed to be a routine patrol. That was all. But then the IED detonated, the insurgents sprung their attack and his fellow marines were gone. Dead.
John was bleeding out far from home. Not the way he wanted to go. Never the way. Old and distinguished, grey hairs in his beard and a life well lived. A death well earned by living long and proper. Not like this.
“Hurt pretty, pretty bad, old man,” said John.
There was gunfire and all John could see was muzzle flare.
“You aren’t going to die. Medic’s not far. Just hold on. You hold on, we get out of here, you owe me a pint at O’Malley’s, you hearing me?”
“Can’t,” said John. “Can’t think.”
Corporal Bradley Roth grimaced at the sight in front of him. Blood on the sand, glistening in the desert sun. Blood on the uniform. Blood where it shouldn’t be.
“Shit. Guess we don’t have time to wait,” said Roth. He swung his rifle behind his back and grabbed John by the shoulders. “This is going to hurt like hell but it’s either that or the reaper, okay?”
“Wha?”
Roth picked Stewart up and slung him over his shoulder.
With gunfire blazing overhead, bullets whizzing past them, Roth began their retreat.
Issue Fifty-SIX: "Coldest Cases"
HoM / VASQUEZ
THE PRESENT DAY, NEW YORK CITY:
“I want to thank you for coming today, Green Lantern,” said the main FBI agent, as he led John Stewart and another down a well-lit corridor.
“Please, call me John,” said the Lantern. He’d been invited to the New York field office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation for reasons that had yet to be made clear. His ring ran defence protocols in the background, invisible to the naked eye, in case this was something more malicious than it appeared. Stewart learned never to go into a situation without coming up with an exit strategy first.
“That’s kinda why we called you in,” said the second agent. “Not ‘cause of your ring and all, but because of who you used to be.”
“How so?” said John.
“Back when you served, you knew Bradley Roth, right?” said the main agent.
“Senator Roth saved my life, it was, ah,” said John. “A shame I couldn’t return the favour.”
Roth approached Stewart to be part of his political campaign, but Stewart turned him down. It was a few moments after that when one of Evil Star’s starlings detonated John’s place of work and nearly killed everyone involved*.
*Obviously, you and I both know nothing is as it seems! Check out Green Lantern #46 for the full story.
When John returned to New York, he’d come to understand that Evil Star continued his murder spree, this time releasing a viral pathogen into the hospital Roth had been recuperating in. No survivors. Salaak had granted him permission to investigate, and Stewart had spent six months following leads in sector 2814, but with no luck.
“Yeah, I don’t know about that,” said the second FBI agent. “Thing is, the Evil Star pathogen story ain’t exactly true. In this day and age you gotta’ be careful about what the public hear, or there’s a mass panic. Here we are--”
The second agent opened a door and John entered.
“Good God,” said Stewart.
The room was full of crime scene photos, arranged around and giving anyone who entered a glimpse into a horror show. There was evidence all around, televisions set up streaming security camera footage. It looked like a monument to a ghastly event, set up to replay when the tapes reached their end.
“When we told you that Evil Star wiped the security camera footage, we lied. We’ve sat on it, unpicking it, constructing and reconstructing the narrative.”
“You lied to me?” said John. “To the families of the victims?”
“You’ll understand why in a moment, John,” said the first agent.
“Bradley Roth got up and killed every single person in that hospital,” said the second agent. “Your Senator Roth went a bit homicidal. Understatement, of course.”
John couldn’t understand. He’d been to the man’s funeral. Then it clicked. “My God. You’re covering it up to protect the government’s reputation.”
“A senator goes mad and kills over a hundred civilians? You bet your ass we’re going to cover it up,” said the second agent.
“It’s not like that,” said the first agent, shaking his head. “But the panic it would cause if this information leaked would be immense. The families of the deceased believe their loved ones died peacefully. Not like this--”
The agent gestured to a scene that played on a loop of a young man being torn into four by Evil Star’s Starling minions.
“Bradley Roth was a good man,” said John. “It couldn’t have been him.”
“Camera don’t lie,” said the second agent. “The videos show Roth waking up after his attack, and those creepy-crawling things scampering around the hospital and dragging them into the dining hall. What happens next it when it gets weird.”
The main agent motioned toward a screen that showed Bradley Roth suck the life out of the assembled men, women and children. Threads of ethereal light left their bodies and were absorbed into Roth. When he took his fill, they collapsed onto the ground, empty husks, some still twitching with the last drops of life slowly dissolving inside them.
“Those starlings are familiars of Evil Star,” said John. “They were there when my place of work was destroyed, when Roth and the rest were injured. It doesn’t make sense.”
“Does it make more sense than this horror show?” said the main agent.
“Godammit. I let you have the scene. You wiped it clean. My ring couldn’t pick up anything when you were done.”
“You need to understand our position--” said the first agent.
“And you’re not really in a position to dictate policy,” said the second.
John clenched his fist. “You should have told me all this six months ago,” said John. “I’ve wasted so much time.” He began to pace, but his attention was drawn to fragments of a metallic substance stuffed inside an evidence bag. His ring tingled in its presence, and he approached it slowly, scanning it covertly.
“Yeah, well, we didn’t need you then--” said the second agent.
“And you aren’t getting me now,” said John. “Thank you for the information.”
Stewart went intangible and shot through the ceiling of the FBI building and flew up until he hit the skies above.
Bradley Roth, a mass murderer? Evil Star? That wasn’t right. It couldn’t be.
Ring, what was with that substance in the evidence room?
<Unknown, but trace amounts detected elsewhere within city limits.> said the ring.
John’s ring pinged a location to him and he willed it to take him there. He shot through the skies like an emerald rocket, the citizens of Manhattan looking up with awe. He had seen men and women wearing t-shirts with the Green Lantern emblem emblazoned upon it over the last few weeks. Children wearing merchandise based around him.
If John were a cynical man, he would have sought out the people creating and distributing said paraphernalia and demanded a cut, but that wasn’t him.
Guy would, maybe.
“Hank, are you reading me?” said John.
There was a slight delay before a projection of Hank Henshaw’s head appeared in front of John.
“What do you need, John?” said Hank.
“FBI just told me that Bradley Roth didn’t die because of Evil Star. They’re pointing the finger and saying he was Evil Star. Can you look into his recent activities, speeches, that kind of thing, and see if anything pops up?”
“Of course,” said Hank. “I’ll get on that now.”
“Thanks, partner,” said John.
SIX MONTHS AGO:
"I will not keep you for long, Lanterns," said the tentacle Protocol Lantern Shorm. The energy construct of his head was floating in front of Hank and John while they themselves floated above the Earth. "In the aftermath of recent events, I wish to inform you of your assignments."
Hank said nothing. John glanced at the former astronaut and then back at Shorm’s projection. "Thanks for taking the time, Shorm."
"John Stewart, you will remain as Green Lantern 2814.1, and Hank Henshaw, you are henceforth reactivated as Green Lantern 2814.2. You will be based in Sector 2814 for the foreseeable future."
"I had requested from Salaak that I work deep space--" said Hank. He caught himself before going any further. "Sorry. Thank you, Shorm."
"Hank Henshaw, your request was acknowledged and denied. You will do the most good in Sector 2814, a hot bed of trouble if there ever was one," said Shorm. "Your attention is required there and nowhere else."
"Thank you, Shorm," said Hank. He looked deflated.
Shorm nodded once, sharply, then vanished.
"You really don’t want to be back on Earth, do you," said John. It wasn’t a question.
"I’ll work my assignment," said Hank.
"Hank, you’ve been out of the loop for a while, I understand that, but you’ve got a chance to rebuild. Head back to Ferris Air, do what you love. You can’t wear the ring all the time," said John.
"I understand that, John. If you don’t mind, Sector 2814 is quite big, and I need to think about a few things. If you need me, just call."
"All right. Stay safe out there," said John.
Hank Henshaw nodded and headed out of Earth’s orbit, past the moon.
TEN YEARS AGO:
“Ah, ah god.” Every moment was fire and John couldn’t understand why. His chest hurt like all hell, and he couldn’t get past it. “God. Christ.”
“Sergeant Stewart? Can you hear me?”
His eyes locked onto the woman speaking. Things began to become clearer as his mind was elevated from the haze of darkness and pain.
“What’s, what’s going on?”
“You were shot. We patched you up and re-inflated the lung, but it’s still going to hurt like an absolute bitch, but now you’re awake we can begin pain management, do you understand me?”
The doctor had hard eyes but she was trying. He could hear a helicopter outside, roaring up a storm of dust and sand.
“Where’s Roth?”
“Corporal Roth was shot too, but don’t worry he’s all right, he’s been airlifted. Your ride is here, we’re going to get you airlifted to home base, get you back up to full speed.”
Stewart’s head lolled back against the stretcher. “Auuughhh.”
“That’s what I want to hear. You’re going home, soldier. You’re damn lucky to be alive.”
Not lucky. Roth didn’t begin in luck. No. He’d been saved by a man, and he now owed that man his life. A debt Stewart full intended to repay.
THE PRESENT DAY, UNDER NEW YORK CITY:
John had his aura pulsating, ready for anything. He had phased beneath the bustling streets and was now entering a large, artificial cavern filled with debris and broken technology. He glanced around. There was no movement.
John wasn’t in the mood for surprises. He extended out his aura so that every shadow, every nook and every cranny was illuminated. In the darkness, gangly limbed things jerked and cackled.
Starlings.
John thought about tracking their every location, about entombing them in emerald spheres. He thought about it and it happened. Dozens of globes appeared and coalesced in the centre of the chamber. Dozens of Starlings.
“Where is Evil Star?” said John.
They skittered and laughed. Beady little eyes darted around the room.
Anger bubbled up inside John. He didn’t like the feeling. “Where is Bradley Roth?”
No response. John’s ring scanned the creatures, and found that the creatures had no physiological function that would allow them to speak.
Typical.
<Biochemical agents detected within the immediate area,> said his ring. <Match mutagenic compound that triggered the metamorphosis of human subjects into plant-hybrids.*>
*John’s ring is referring to the events of Green Lantern #40
John looked over to the shattered remains of a lab area and his ring scanned the broken shards of glass and spilt chemicals. Coloured shades had stained the walls and floor. It had been a while since the explosion that ravaged the underground lair had occurred, but the effects were still obvious.
<Chemicals are inert, but match recorded signatures.>
Evil Star was behind the Solomon Grundy toxin?
<95% probability of that being the case,> said his ring.
Add another offence to his sheet, said John.
John turned his attention back to the Starlings. They were unable to speak?
That was fine, he didn’t need their mouths. Just their eyes.
John plucked one of the Starlings from the sphere and his ring shot light between his ears, so that his eyes lit up green. Tiny, black brain cells were being examined at lightning speeds. The Starling shrieked, confused, but then when the process continued, it grew bored of its panic. It hung, suspended by light, in the middle of the room, slapping its feet together.
John found the memory he was looking for and began to replay it, a construct swirling from the recollection.
From one of the nooks in the wall, the Starling had watched its master re-enter the lair. The view was distorted, like the recording was from a fish-eye lens. A side-effect of the Starling’s lack of cognitive ability.
The voices were distorted but John’s ring attempted to stabilise them. The volumes shifted in pitch and tenor as the Starling that had been listening moved around the room to get a better view.
"I never like pushing my luck. And your face was causing me so much discomfort, Senator."
The Starling’s eyes had darted from Evil Star to a cage on the far side of the room. Inside the cage was a man that appeared to be Bradley Roth. He was curled up and John had to enhance the construct to get a better look at him, but he was still blurry, still somewhat out of focus. The Starling had blinked and Bradley became clearer.
His once thick, black hair was now grey and thinning. His skin was creased and crumped, like a battered old book. John could hear the man wheeze as he spoke.
"Yuh you'll never get ah away with this, you buh bastard..."
"I already have, I wore your face, I took your youth to fuel my own, and with your face on my face, I stole the youth of every single man, woman and child in that insipid hospital John Stewart took me to. How wonderful. You're the monster, Roth. You're the villain."
John paused the reconstruction.
That was it. The admission of guilt. Roth was innocent, but would the police accept an emerald transmission from the brain of a barely cognitive familiar to a cosmic super villain? It seemed to insane to be true. John couldn’t allow Roth to be slandered as a mass murderer. He owed his friend that and more.
John continued with the reconstruction and found the focus now on Roth. "Juh John?"
John felt his heart drop.
"Yes, your old friend! Did you know he's now a Green Lantern?"
Roth seemed to double in size. The Starling had crawled closer to the cage. With one final, resounding act of defiance, Bradley grabbed the bars of the cage and levelled his stare at Evil Star.
"Huh he'll stop you.”
John watched the rest of the reconstruction in silence. He saw Evil Star activate a device built from cargo cult Oan and Apokoliptikan technology. He saw the explosion that reduced Bradley Roth to ash, and then that was it.
The Starling had run away when the first wave of energy decimated its brethren, finding a nook in the wall it could cower in for the duration of the incident.
John knelt down by the patch of scorched concrete that had once been Bradley Roth. It was almost laughable, that after they had fought through, the skirmishes, the wars, the bar fights, that it came down to this.
“Brad, I’m sorry,” said John. He knelt down and brushed his fingers across the floor. “You saved my life and I couldn’t save yours. I’m so sorry.”
John’s ring pulled a phone number from the ether and dialled it. “This is John Stewart. Yu wanted my help so here it is. I’m uploading some evidence to the FBI servers that you’ll want to see. It should clear Senator Roth of any wrong-doing. Evil Star is still out there and I’m going to bring him in.”
John now had to track down Evil Star. There was no trace of him after the explosion that killed Roth.
Where to now?
“Hank, you got anything for me?” said John.
Henshaw’s face appeared in front of John, projected from wherever Hank was and channelled through John’s ring. "Have you ever listened to Roth’s speeches? Check this one out--"Hank sent a construct through to John’s ring that opened up to reveal footage of Roth at a rally.
“Something is wrong with the world if we continue to let these ‘illegal aliens’ run rampant across our land, over our borders; the alien threat, one from without emerging within, it’s such a real problem that needs to be recognised. We have a problem with immigration, and we try our best to fix that, but the parallels to that and this are so real, so tangible; aliens come to Earth. Aliens settle on Earth. Aliens lead to more aliens leads to disputes and wars and we’re caught in the middle. That can’t do, not at all. The rights of humanity must be heard. We’re being threatened by a force that can destroy us without a thought for our own safety. Someone must speak out against them.”
“Brad was a passionate man,” said John. “You got anything that might link Roth to Evil Star?”
"Nothing so far, I’m afraid."
“I appreciate you doing the legwork,” said John. He watched Hank’s expression shift. “Something else on your mind?”
"There’s passion and there’s zealotry, John. After Mongul’s attack on Coast City, Roth went on to organise a number of rallies demanding that there be more control over alien presences on Earth. He used Coast City as a direct example of the need for better regulation*”
*This is true, also way back in Green Lantern #36. I’ve been planning this for a while, guys!
“You think the man was wrong?” said John. “Mongul obliterated a city and killed you. He sicced Lobo on Guy.* Now we have Evil Star running around slaughtering innocents. I can’t help but think the man had a point.”
*That all happened in Green Lantern #35
"Evil Star and Bradley Roth are the same person," said Hank. "All the evidence points to that."
“I can’t believe that, Hank. I wont believe that.”
"I’ll back your play 100%, and I’ll keep my distance until you’re done with your investigation, but don’t hesitate to call me in if you need me," said Hank. "In the meantime, I’m going to look into some odd readings my ring’s picked up*. Keep me in the loop, all right?"
*Check out Hank’s adventure back in Green Lantern #53
“Same to you,” said John.
"Roger," said Hank. His face vanished from sight, the emerald energy dissipating back into John’s ring.
<Green Lantern 2814.1, the energy signature and profile of the criminal designated ‘’Evil Star’ matches a cold case in Sector 2814.>
The voice from the ring wasn’t Hank Henshaw’s. The accent was foreign but John couldn’t place exactly how foreign, and he’d been based all over the world. Alien then, translated through the ring’s circuits. But who?
<Please proceed to the co-ordinates I have uploaded to your ring. More information to follow on arrival.>
“Who is this?” said John.
<Sector co-ordinates plotted, optimal route calculated. Proceed?>
Hank Henshaw’s voice had returned. Whoever had transmitted through his ring was now offline.
Ring, I want to know who that was.
<Data unavailable. No further information available until arrival at co-ordinates. Proceed?>
A mystery then. He programmed a message to send if anything went wrong to Hank, wherever he was, and another two to the NYPD and STAR Labs Manhattan. You can’t just leave an underground lair to gather dust. There would be decommissioning. Investigation. Evidence gathering.
With that all done, John prepped his ring.
<Ring charge at 95%>
Happy to continue, John launched himself up and began the sojourn into space. As soon as he was out of range of Earth, he hit subluminal and he allowed his ring to place him stasis for the journey to conserve energy.
NOT LONG AFTER...
<You are now entering the Auron space system,> said his ring. <Journey time three hours and fifty four minutes.>
John’s eyes opened and the subluminal tunnel faded away. The planet ahead of him resembled Earth, but with five rings encircling it. John’s mind wandered to images of atoms, swirling in the infinitesimal spaces beyond human perception.
In the distance, the Sun popped and shuddered, as light seeped from one side of it, a slow, gaping wound in the heart of a star bleeding out solar energy.
Ring, what’s happening to the Sun?
<Ring detects space time deformation. Black hole present. Keep a safe distance // warnings activated // planet below will be caught in gravitational wake within the next 48 hours.>
There’s a time limit on this investigation then, thought John.
<Thank you for coming, Green Lantern 2814.1, this cold case has been on the books for some time now,> said the voice in his ring.
"Who are you?"
<I am Protocol Lantern Dranz. As Protocol Lantern, my duties include the management of information pertaining to open investigations, as well as sensitive information.>
"Protocol Lantern? Shorm is Protocol Lantern."
<I am recording this interactive construct // calculating // one thousand years, one month, thirteen days, four hours, six minutes // prior to our current conversation. I have uploaded my consciousness to the construct in an effort to convey the nature of this incident to you.>
John had never heard of such a process. But the rings retained the characteristics and voice of their previous bearer, that was standard practice, and Sinestro had been demonstrating some previously hidden features of the power ring since his return to the Green Lantern Corps, so maybe there was more the ring could do that John wasn’t yet aware of? He would have to ask Sinestro later.
One thousand years, one month, thirteen days, four hours, six minutes?
"Ring, the cosmic blackout event that shut down all power rings*, how long ago did that take place specifically?*"
*Back in Green Lantern #47
<One month, thirteen days, four hours, six minutes ago.>
A thousand years to the day that Auron came onto Dranz’s books. That was it then, Evil Star had been the one to trigger the disaster that extinguished suns and sucked the life out of every power ring in the galaxy. Billions had died, and John would level that charge at Evil Star’s feet.
Salaak had diverted a majority of the Corps' manpower to help in the reconstruction and support of the societies struck hardest by the event, but they were already stretched so thin.
"Ring, upload these findings to the Book of Oa, Salaak needs to know immediately,” said John.
<Green Lantern 2814.1, are you ready for us to continue?> said former Protocol Lantern Dranz.
John looked down at the planet below. "What does Evil Star have to do with Auron?”
A construct swirled out from John’s ring and took shape in front of him. The shape wasn’t humanoid in any sense of the world. It was an abstract number of coalescing angles, and beneath the hard angles was a secondary system of shapes resembling a nervous system. Little sparks of light flowed from the bottom of the shape and around the angles, toward the Green Lantern power ring on what appeared to be a limb.
John couldn’t be sure.
<Auron was once one of the most prosperous, scientifically-minded planets in the whole of the universe.>
The shape that must have been Dranz headed down toward the surface of the planet, and John followed.
<But it was struck by a great plague. Millions died. All of their science, all of their advances in medicine and they couldn’t halt its progression through their cities.>
They landed in the middle of a clearing in the middle of a grand, sweeping forest. John looked down at his foot and saw traces of concrete along the ground.
The Dranz construct gestured with his arm and John’s ring projected the true sight of Auron’s capitol city onto the lush forest tapestry. Tall spires surrounded by buzzing blue light, hover-crafts shuttling to and from smaller sub-stations. Humanoid constructs began to pass them by, going about their day.
The true face of Auron.
<We’re standing in the middle of Auron’s capitol, Aurondon Shannar. This is where the plague originated.>
“What caused it?” said John.
<The plague was genetically bonded to the DNA of the Auron people. They could not escape it, but they knew they were the only victims it could infect. They quarantined the planet, and all satellite colonies were ordered to never return here.>
“Genetically-bonded? So man-made? It was biochemical warfare?”
<Lab recordings suggest an accident caused the outbreak,> said Dranz. <Supposition, of course. Transmissions do not tell the full story. Regardless, Auron decreed that the Green Lantern Corps were not to interfere with their world’s crisis, even if it meant their deaths.>
“That’s mad,” said John. “God. A scientist did this? Was it Evil Star?”
<Unknown, facial recognition software does not confirm that,> said Dranz. <Sufficed to say, the Auron ruling science council focused all their energies on finding a cure.>
The projection changed, and Dranz led John up, into the sky, toward the highest spire. They went intangible, pushed through the foliage, and entered a large complex that peaked up through the clouds.
The emerald projection faded and John saw that the interior of the complex was a laboratory, preserved after all the centuries it had been abandoned.
<A lone scientist directed his previous research into the distribution of energies for the sake of prolonging the lives of the people into the search for a cure,> said Dranz.
A construct moved through the lab. He was a small man, a visor orbiting his head and a long lab coat fluttered behind him as he went about his work.
<Test subjects were required for the progression of the experiments. A decree was put forward by the science council for the use of inmates serving life sentences in the prisons,> said Dranz. <In this time, the society became more insular, in the hopes of preventing progression of the plague. Automated systems were increased, and oversight became minimal.>
“Living test subjects? This is sounding more and more like a horror show,” said John.
<The Guardians of the Universe agreed with that assessment, and sent Sector 2814’s Green Lantern, a medical genius in his own right, to assist with theeeeee>
Dranz’s construct began to fade, and the plateau of moving figures that John’s ring had been projecting vanished with him.
“Don’t you think that was boring?”
John sent finder beams into the dark. They found their target and illuminated the area, revealing a man clad in black and purple, a long cape twinkling with stars rolling down his shoulders. He wore a mask, but the eye slits were charred, and there was scar tissue around his eyelids.
Evil Star smiled and licked his lips.
“Hands on your head,” said John. “One warning.”
The Green Lantern had levelled his ring at the villain, ready for anything.
Evil Star laughed. “I came here six months ago to collect myself after the trauma I experienced back on Earth. You can’t imagine what I went through.”
John’s ring erupted with concentrated energy, his willpower directly behind it but instead of it shooting outwards with destruction fury, it flowed directly into Evil Star’s hand.
The sphere of light coalesced above Evil Star’s palm, and the villain’s smile widened.
“You can’t imagine what I went through,” said Evil Star. “Would have been a time that sitting in the dark, as I have these past few months, would drain my Star Band, keeping me from doing all the marvellous things I was born to do.”
Evil Star threw the energy back at John. The impact shocked John, sparks of emerald light riveting through his protective aura, and he was thrown from the lab into the cool Auron air outside.
Evil Star followed and his cape fluttered as he floated high above the ground.
“That time is past,” said Evil Star. “I have become so much more since I saw the light.”
Without a word, John sent his ring beneath the surface of the world and found the foundations of the building they had just been inside. He thought about the foundations crumbling, about capturing the building before it toppled, then redirecting it down upon them both. As he thought about it, it happened, and the tallest building on Auron was driven down toward Evil Star.
John’s aura throbbed as tonnes of concrete, metal and more slammed down all around him. He held his ground, better to stay small and stay strong than try and zip around or through the debris. Once the collapse was complete he surged upwards, to the surface, and saw what his imagination had wrought. The destruction he had caused.
Evil Star was nowhere to be seen.
It’s never that easy, thought John.
A purple energy construct grabbed John and dragged him to the ground. The construct was flowing from Evil Star’s arm, an extension of his own being.
<Save us, Green Lantern, please, save us.>
John didn’t know where the voices were coming from, but at this point in time he didn’t have the time care.
Evil Star was laughing as the construct he had projected from his hand returned to his flesh.
“I no longer seek power, I am power,” said Evil Star. “I absorb whatever you throw at me and I take it inside myself. Every blast, every construct, every stray thought made into reality, it empowers me like nothing else before.”
John understood two things Evil Star was saying. He was infinitely more powerful than a Green Lantern, and he was insane. The power he threw shook the planet, and cracks formed on the surface of the ruined, overgrown city they battled in.
What could John do?
Ring, redirect all power into altering this planet’s orbit. Take us as close to the black hole as possible, thought John. Then keep going. Keep the planet together so the stresses don’t tear it apart.
“They whisper to me, these creatures I take into my being, they beg for release,” said Evil Star. “What are their names? Oh, shall I let them tell you?”
The madman opened his mouth, and purple, glowing fingers attempted to claw their way out from his throat. His head stretched and grew, to accommodate the thing that tried desperately to escape his body, until John could see the creature’s face.
<I just want to protect love,> hissed the Predator.
Evil Star swallowed and laughed, the Predator being absorbed back down into his body.
“I’m like a battery,” said Evil Star. “I take everything you throw and I eat it all up, then it becomes part of me.”
Evil Star had his back to the Sun as the last remnants of its light were eaten by the black hole.
“I used to be just like you,” said Evil Star. “So optimistic. So brave. But when I saw what happened to these people, on this blight of a planet all those centuries ago, I knew enough was enough.”
“You used to be a Green Lantern,” said John. He could feel sweat dribble down the back of his head. His ring hand was shaking as he concentrated on holding the world together and sending it to it’sits doom.
“Ah, you guessed the end to Dranz’s story, that’s nice for you,” said Evil Star.
“You failed in your duty, so you decided to turn on the Corps? On the universe?”
Evil Star swatted John across the floor and the entire world shook violently as the Green Lantern’s concentration wavered. John coughed blood, his protective aura at a low point considering the amount of power he was shovelling into the act of moving a planet.
“I did not turn my back on the universe, I just decided to look at it from a different angle,” said Evil Star. “I saw the benefits of the Auron scientist’s experiments, even if his methods were vile. I put a stop to them, but he decided that one last gasp toward immortality was worth defying the Green Lantern Corps. He activated the machine, but was too close. He died in the blast that stole the lives of every single surviving Auron, and deposited their souls inside me.”
Evil Star opened his arms wide and thousands of energy projections of men, women and children shot toward Stewart. Every single person the villain had murdered across a thousand years flooded out of his body, their appearance streaked purple and green.
John rolled into a ditch to dodge the first wave of constructs, and then used his ring to dig into the ground, sealing himself up so he couldn’t be found, protected only by his aura.
Dozens of hands found him, and dragged him up. They scratched and clawed at him, Evil Star laughing all the while. Their attacks began to lessen, and John opened his eyes to see the projections be dragged away from him, back toward Evil Star.
Stewart could feel his own body by pulled forward too, as the gravity of the planet began to change massively.
Evil Star finally turned around, and saw the hole in space that John Stewart was pushing them toward. He turned back to face John, who then threw a large layer of the planet’s crust directly at Evil Star’s face, sending him flying up into orbit, and toward the black sun.
John followed the villain, sending chunks of debris at the former-Green-Lantern-turned-Evil-Star. He didn’t let the man get a word in, didn’t let him focus the power he had within his grasp. John didn’t both with energy constructs, knowing that he’d simply be giving Evil Star more ammunition to throw back at him, but he was tearing Auron to shreds with his power ring, using the ghost world to barrage his opponent.
“Why do you keep FIGHTING,” screamed Evil Star, as the man cut swathes through the debris coming toward him, swirling swords of green and purple energy flickering around his hands as John threw a dying world at him.
“Because you’re still standing,” said John, as the planet finally gave up the ghost and detonated, a blinding white light engulfing his senses before he could do anything else.
Debris either atomised in the explosion or was dragged immediately into the black hole, and John fought past the concussive effects of the detonation to make sure Evil Star didn’t get away. His ring was dying, but if he was able to push the villain into the black hole, then he could pull back, regroup, get a signal out to the rest of the Corps to make sure the threat was finally put to bed.
John could finally avenge the loss of Bradley Roth.
As the white streaks before his eyes were blinked away, John finally saw Evil Star.
The man with him caused John’s heart to drop.
“It looks like you could use a hand, Green Lantern,” said the pale, yellow-skinned half-man that floated in front of the black hole, gripping the comatose Evil Star’s throat in his left hand.
“Not from the likes of you, Parallax,” said John.
Parallax. The first Green Lantern. The creature who ravaged Oa and killed countless Guardians of the Universe before they managed to take him down. He re-emerged thousands of years later, caused trouble for Hal Jordan before vanishing into the shadows of the universe. Last seen during the Red Lantern war in Sector 0, responsible for the death of every living thing in Sector 666*.
*John is remembering the events of Scarlet Reign, which ran through Green Lantern #44-50
Parallax was a raving lunatic who thrived on chaos, capable of unleashing power of a scale John could barely fathom. And now he was here, with Evil Star in his clutches. A smile on his face.
John’s ring was nearly dead, the amount of power required to survive so close to the black hole would deplete his ring’s charge in no time at all, and now the greatest threat to the Green Lantern Corps was floating before him, a sadistic smile framing his razor sharp teeth.
“You’re not even going to beg for your life?” said Parallax. He levelled his right hand in a fist in John’s direction, golden energy crackling around his knuckles. “You know who I am, what I’m capable of.”
“So why bother begging?” said John.
Parallax smiled. “Oh, I like you. Would be a shame--” The energy crackle flitted in the space between the two men, and John was gripped by a hard energy garrotte around his neck. “--To snuff you out. But I’ll tell you what, I’ll tell you this, I hate your kind more than anything in this universe. I hate you and I hate that I haven’t wiped the emerald scourge of the corps from the face of the galaxy yet. But then I started thinking about everything I could do to ruin your lives, and I had an epiphany.”
John choked, his ring fluctuating, his protective aura beginning to fade. Behind Parallax, the black hole flickered a burning, coalescing orange, as if it had caught alight. The black hole swirled and began to bright like an inferno in the darkness of space.
“I’m going to weaponise this universe against you,” said Parallax. “Every threat and every horror, I will find, I will nurture, and I will unleash a thousand-fold on your home worlds, on Oa, on every single emerald soul that wields a ring.” The monster drew John closer to himself, and then removed the choking construct that held John tight. “Do you know why I’m telling you all this?”
John summoned the last iota of power in his ring and roared as the blade construct he generated sliced through Parallax’s right arm, causing the monstrous begin to shriek in pain.
That was it-- before John could take advantage of this moment and recharge his ring, Parallax sent a catastrophic burst of energy at him, throwing him backwards into the burning hole in the universe behind him.
John felt the universe stretch and pulse around him as he was caught in the event horizon of the no-longer-black hole.
Everything ran rampant around him, space and time no longer made sense, and as his ring died--
“You’re not dying today, John,” said Stewart, a defiant statement to himself as everything twisted around him.
It wasn’t his time. He’d survived wars on Earth, in space. Invasions, too. Hell, he’d died on Oa, only to be saved by Henshaw and Sinestro. A black hole wouldn’t stop him. It couldn’t. What did he have left? The dying embers of a ring charge, and his willpower. And a belief in the fact that today wasn’t his day to die.
“Get. Me. Out of here! ”
An emerald chain shot out the swirling space-time event he was caught inside, and even though the act should have felt like picking a lock with a piece of spaghetti, the construct held, locked hard with the outside universe. John looked behind him, and saw fragments of reality run like scenes playing on a battered VHS player.
Even as the chain wrenched him back into the universe proper, he saw the Guardians of the Universe forge the first power ring, and the un-mutated form of Parallax gratefully receive the honour of becoming the first Green Lantern.
Oa burned as Parallax ran rampant, rage gripping his heart after the destruction of his own people. The last of his kind. Green Lantern no more.
Events accelerated. A sobbing, mentally broken Green Lantern not in control of his actions as he destroyed the Central Power Battery to further the cause of Darkseid’s Apokolips Imperative. Leaving a powerless corps in ruins.
Events accelerated. Kyle Rayner-- Ion-- sacrificed his life to reignite the Central Power Battery and imprison the rogue Guardian known as Krona, giving the newly reborn Green Lantern Corps a chance to finally turn the tide against the Manhunter hordes who conquered Oa, their rings recharged at long last.
Events accelerated. The Guardians of the Universe left this plane of existence with their Zamoran counterparts, leaving the Green Lantern Corps to govern themselves.
Events accelerated. More threats rose against the Green Lantern Corps and the universe. Red Lanterns-- harbingers of rage-- arrived from a parallel universe and nearly destroyed everything the Corps had built. The Star Sapphire Corps-- Love Lanterns-- joined forces with the reluctant Green Lanterns to ensure the sanctity of the galaxy.
Events accelerated beyond this moment in time--
Parallax presided over a legion of monsters, theirs hearts burning, the chaos they were capable of unleashing palpable. Their laughter and screams of insanity were a battle cry. Worlds wept as they approached.
A mechanical monstrosity roamed the stars, bigger than the worlds it devoured, and demons emerged from the ashes, terrors prepared to tear apart sectors of space.
A black-clad man wielded a ring of immense power, spreading his evil across the universe. His face was familiar, human, but John’s mind couldn’t comprehend his identity.
The fiery wall that separated the Red Lantern Corps and their adopted home sector of 666 dropped, and Atrocitus declared war against the galaxy. Another corps, another reason to take up arms.
Yellow rings found bearers across the galaxy, a new breed of terror taking root even as the rest of the universe suffered at the mounting threats that overwhelmed them.
A flaming cerulean light from the beginning of time emerged from the forbidden zones of the universe and headed toward Earth, its appearance a final act of vengeance struck from a being long dead.
Crackling scythes cut through space, and sentinels patrolled the galaxy, the dead rings of dead Green Lanterns hanging around their necks as they bought peace to their realms--
Without any warning and through one sheer act of willpower unlike anything the universe had ever witnessed, John Stewart emerged from the black hole, Auron now a debris field, no sign of Parallax or Evil Star, the black hole no longer on fire. John pulled his power battery from its pocket dimension and recharged before his ring died for good.
What had John just seen? The past, the present, and then, what, potential futures? Glimpses like tea leaves, something for John to interpret, assign meaning...
John Stewart headed to Sector 0, to Oa, his mind heavy with everything he had witnessed. This wasn’t something he could sit on, and he knew that if any of what he saw was to happen, then the universe would suffer. He pushed hard on his ring, and shot into the slipstreams the Corps used to travel the universe…
MEANWHILE, ELSEWHERE IN THE UNIVERSE...
Evil Star felt the tubes and wires moving around under his skin. There was no discomfort, just the knowledge that there was something inside him, something more than the cosmic forces he attracted and stored inside his being.
“Hello,” said Parallax, looking down at the bound form of Evil Star.
“Whaaaat? ” said Evil Star, his words falling sluggishly from his lips.
“I can see what you are, and the potential you hold within you,” said Parallax. “You are capable of attracting and storing power sources into your being. Using that power for your own agenda. A living power battery. A wonder. Just like Kyle Rayner.”
“Whaaaat haaaave youuuu dooone? ”
“Simple, really,” said Parallax. “I can’t let you run around unchecked in the universe. Simple as. You might jeopardise my work. I’m building my own army, you see. Igniting madness and using those fires as a weapon against the peaceful reign of the Green Lantern Corps. So, until I find a reason for you to be in existence, I’m going to put you to sleep. Let you rest.”
Evil Star blinked, even as his vision began to blur. He saw the mirrored surface above his body, even his body looked completely foreign to him. There were tubes pushing themselves into every part of his exposed flesh, wires feeding in around the small, circular wounds each tube had inflicted on entry. His chest was open and he saw his heart, or where his heart should have been. Instead he saw lights coalesce together, swirling like oil and water.
“Sleep well, Evil Star,” said Parallax. “There’ll be a place for you in what comes next.”
“Sleeeeeep,” said Evil Star. “That sooooundssss niiiceeee--”
NEXT ISSUE: Guy Gardner investigate a mysterious distress beacon from an abandoned colony deep in space, while Hank Henshaw is confronted by the man who engineered the death of his crew back during his days as an astronaut-- none other than the recently exonerated Lex Luthor. What happens when Hank is pushed even further toward the edge than ever before? FIND OUT NEXT MONTH!
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