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thejusticelounge2012-10-28 08:02 pm
bossymarmalade) wrote in thejusticelounge2012-10-28 08:02 pm
purge of the soul
Kyle got the message from Hal just as it seemed Kate was starting to drift asleep, just a bit. Enough for him to be able to leave her. If Hal was ready to Lantern, it meant Ollie was okay. If Ollie was okay, it meant Kate would want to see him. And if Kate and Ollie were together, then it meant it was time for him to get back to work.
Kyle paused on the way there, floating mid-air as he looked at himself in a reflective surface along a hallway. He was fine. Guy was fine. Kate and Ollie were fine. Which meant Hal was fine. And as for Roy…well. They’d make him fine, whether he wanted it or not. He nodded and kept going, flying faster when he saw the two familiar green glows in the airlock.
“Sorry for being late,” he apologized by rote, and looked from one to the other. “Time to go?”
Guy shoved his fists is his pockets and glanced at Hal. “Time to go,” he agreed, briefly thinking back to the last time he and Kyle had to get all official like this before rolling out; it had been to track down and arrest a SeRVE member who had broken his parole terms, and one they’d both grown to like, personally.
Now, they had to go after an ally-turned-Red Lantern. A friend. The son of a close friend. When was their work as Green Lanterns going to start becoming satisfying, if not enjoyable, once again?
Hal had charged his ring up, and had been waiting for the other two at the airlock. Hands clasped behind his back, he floated just off the floor in a sort of parade rest, his mind working a hundred miles a minute. They had to find Roy, clean him up, and bring him how. Someone needed to chain that boy to the wall, and Hal himself had a good mind to, with all the grief Roy had caused Ollie of late.
When the other two had joined him, he nodded and punched the panel to open the lock.
“Let’s go.”
He pushed away from the platform, letting the other two join him before proceeding.
“We have to find him first, and he could be almost anywhere,” he said. “Safe bet…He’s headed for Ysmault. We have to catch him BEFORE he gets there…or we might lose him.” To his knowledge, there had never been a human member of the Red Lantern Corps (Guy notwithstanding). The Greens had been bad enough…what would Red be like?
“Y’know the way Roy was all this time, I wouldn’t be surprised if he was taking the scenic route to Ysmault,” Kyle said, boosting his will a bit to fly flush with the other two. This wasn’t the time for theatrics. “Plus I’ll bet with his lack of experience, he might just be burning fuel, like a Reaver ship when it’s hungry…” Kyle thumbed his ring thoughtfully.
“Ring, scan for traces of Red Lantern…energy burn? Rageerny? Angry exhaust? Fan and track the rage crumbs.”
Kyle’s ring sparked for a bit and then a series of green dots - not unlike bread crumbs - sprinkled a path to their left, stretching out into the distance. “Looks like he headed that way.” Hal was right. The path was jagged and schizophrenic, but it was definitely in the direction of the Red Lanterns base.
Guy managed to not chuckle as Kyle described what he needed from his ring. It was a good thing Kyle’s ring, as well as his closest colleagues, understood him clearly; Kyle’s speech patterns were sometimes as creative as his art was, and not everyone found it as endearing as Guy or Hal.
“So we make a beeline course there, while tracking Roy’s course, we’ll shave off even more time, an’ catch up all the sooner,” Guy agreed, as he ringed a similar beacon for them to follow that would run alongside Roy’s course, but far more directly bound for Ysmault.
“We got our course, now we just pour on the speed,” he said, pulling ahead slightly to get them started. “Anyone got a strategy for taking him down once we find him? I’m thinkin’ there’s three of us, two could keep ‘em busy, the third could grab him from behind, avoid the acid-blood?”
“Most important things are that we don’t get that napalm on us…and we try not to hurt him.” That was a tall order, especially with a manic Red Lantern. They were primal in the strictest sense, violent and wild, lashing out at anything or anyone who got near them. Hal was just thankful that Roy hadn’t been in full on rage yet when he’d found Ollie and Kate…otherwise…
Don’t think about that, he told himself. His aura burned a bit brighter as he took off, leaving a trail of green in his wake. He wasn’t feeling chatty right now. Normally banter would lighten a situation, but this…this just felt surreal.
“I hope no one else runs into him before we do..” he muttered, then glanced at the others. “Do we have a plan for healing him?”
“Mogo,” Kyle answered easily. He sped up, following a bit along Guy’s straighter course to Ysmault, then diverting along his own trail. Really, sped up so he could turn to glance at Guy and then Hal, as surreptitiously as he could. Truth was, he knew he should be nervous as hell, but he was damn tired of feeling that way. Of thinking about all the pieces of the puzzles, trying to fit them together, tie his feelings to Roy to Ollie to being nearly killed. To Kate and then to Hal. To Mia and Connor and Lian…that whole poor shattered little family…To Guy and to Red Lantern. To Jaime and his Khaji. To Dick and Wally, confused and hurt. It was too much to think about. Too much to get upset over; so the simple solution was to just not think about it at all, and focus on just one detail of the bigger picture: get Roy back.
“Guy got a hold of Salaak, and he contacted me a couple hours ago…” Wait…no was that a dream? No, no it couldn’t be. Kyle shook his head, clearing his throat. “Salaak said Mogo could sense something was wrong and he’s - it’s - preparing himself for our arrival. We just need to get Roy all packaged and FedExed by us. Once we’re down on Mogo, he’ll take care of Roy.” Like he took care of Guy, just…plopped him right into a healing slurry and then Guy went green again.
Green and gooey and…Kyle roughly shook his head again to get the sudden onslaught of bobbling thoughts out of his head…and suddenly came to a stop. He pointed. They were out of the solar system, where a cloud of comets were clouding through a strip of space…and among the space dust they could see a frenetic red glow, blood-colored globs tearing a swath through the passing comet trails.
Guy was trying to forget the reminder of his experience with Mogo; while he was close with the other lantern now, he could still remember the last moments of his healing, of leeches working at superfast speed to filter the napalm from his bloodstream. And heal they did, but they were still leeches, squirming into his nose, mouth, ears, even his throat and lungs. He shuddered at the memory, when Kyle pointed out their target.
Guy consulted his ring for confirmation. “Yeah…that’s Roy, all right. Can you guys keep him occupied while I try an’ tackle him from behind, or do either of ya have a better plan?” He looked first to his partner, then to Hal.
Hal stopped when Kyle pointed, nodding at the red gleam against black space. They were right, that erratic pattern hadn’t gotten him very far at all…all the better for them, really. Mulling over the “plan”, he licked his lips slowly, thinking.
”We need to cover his mouth,” he said. “That will cut down his danger significantly…Once you grab him,” he looked at Guy. “What do you plan to do with him? You can’t very well muscle him all the way to Mogo..”
“Short of getting Mogo to come to us, or fetching a Blue Lantern, It’s that, or we knock Roy out,” Guy replied, folding his arms. “I’m open to suggestions. Kyle, how did you guys finally get me subdued and delivered to Mogo?”
Kyle reflected Guy and folded his arms as well, leaning backwards into nothing. “Mogo was right there. At Oa. Mogo came to help us…” Kyle squinted at Roy in the distance, glad to have this almost odd little pocket of time to plan carefully. If it had been any another Red Lantern, these precautions were unnecessary. Take down by any means possible. But it wasn’t any Red Lantern - it was Roy. It was their friend. They needed to subdue, not attack. Kyle sucked his teeth as he thought.
“Jump points. There’s gotta be one around here somewhere. Salaak might know, then once we subdue Roy, we can just get Salaak to activate the jump point and boom - straight to Mogo.” Kyle flew a bit away so he could get in comms with Salaak, as the other two sorted out their plan for getting Roy safely constrained.
Nodding, Hal rolled his shoulders out a bit. He hated going into this without a real plan, but they didn’t have much choice. Red lanterns were dangerous and volatile, and took more than brute force or finesse to control. They took both. Lucky for him, he had a master of each on either side, so maybe this wouldn’t be impossible.
“Let’s go.”
On the comm, Salaak chastised Kyle for being out of his designated sector, but told him that there was a jump point not far from the sector house. It wasn’t close but it was better than nothing. In the interest of controlling a rogue red lantern, he was all too happy to make the proper arrangements. Notify the sector’s lanterns they were coming, make preparations for the jump and ensure they could get as close to Mogo as possible.
He also reminded Kyle that they ALL now “owed him one”, as the Earthers say.
In the process of flying for this long, space and its entirety should be a big thing. This should hold some sort of significance other than, ‘Oh gee look at all the stars!’ But it doesn’t and Roy doesn’t even look around to see where he’s going or hell, where he’s at. Instead he’s just a ball full of rage. Swiping at comets like he’s Babe Ruth and nothing matters except for the anger. It’s unflickering, fueling him to move forward and obey.
Deep down, the little boy inside of him is tearing at his inner walls. He just wants out. He just wants to get home, but this thing. This red light keeps dragging him back into the darkness. He knows..he knows what’s happening. He’s dying inside and this ring of power. It’s the only thing keeping him alive now. Spreading acid through his body like some conduit.
And at first he doesn’t feel anything. Just the comets whizzing by, the dust of the ones he obliterates and then suddenly he feels hostile. More than before but to the point that he’s entire body just jerks and turns around. Snarling with the acid spew coming out of his mouth in a likeness to a cat hissing, Roy sees Green and the only emotion that comes along with it is kill.
Oh god, look at him now. If Ollie were here, he’d smack some sense into him or tell him how silly it was to feel ‘kill’. ‘Don’t you know kid? You can’t feel your actions inside, that’s why they’re called actions. It’s what you do.’
“Owe him one?” Guy echoed as Kyle relayed Salaak’s words. “Why that pompous, gangly, bug-headed…” he began to rant as he turned to leave, and circle around behind their target as planned.
He brought himself up short, though, as he looked over and saw the distant red light cease in its smashing of comets and leave a trail of red light to show he was on the move again. He wasn’t moving away, however, but on a direct path towards the three of them. “Throw out the playbook, gents, he’s spotted us,” he pointed as he rejoined the team once more. “So much for the element of surprise.”
“So much,” Kyle said grimly, flying towards Roy with the others, erecting a shield to cover the other two as they took the offense. “Doesn’t change the plan. Restraining him’ll only last so long. We gotta do it fast and it’s gotta be as little force as possible…” As if. It had been hard enough restraining Guy for all of ten minutes, and that was at least six experienced Green Lanterns doing the job.
But no. No that wasn’t the way to think about it - Guy knew what it was like to be a Lantern; Roy had no clue. And there was something to be said about being a Green Lantern from Earth. Guy Gardner and Hal Jordan. Kilowog and John were the only other two who matched their abilities, in Kyle’s secret opinion. They could do this. They will do this.
Kyle flipped the shield and expanded it to enshroud all of them within a small globe; the hull was thick enough to withstand Roy’s blasts, if he tried - but Kyle was betting the red rage in him would be hell-bent on attacking, not escaping. Still, if they could manage to back him into a corner and pour green over him - like pouring plaster over a mold - Kyle was sure they’d be able to create a full-body encasement strong enough to buy the time it took to get to the jump point.
“Han Solo in carbonite,” Kyle said suddenly, and dodged a blast of red rage that Roy blasted out. “We just gotta overwhelm him, let him fight against that, while we concentrate on getting him to the jump—” The second time Roy red-blasted out, Kyle didn’t dodge in time. He slammed backwards into his own globular shield with a loud “OOF”
Hal wasted no time in throwing a lasso around Roy, hauling him backward to get him off of Kyle. He knew the Red Lantern could probably break the bond if he tried, but it bought Kyle precious seconds to get away. Of course, that also shifted Roy’s focus to HIM directly, and he had to move quickly to dodge his attacks.
“Got a last ditch idea,” he said, a large shield forming over his arms as he brought them up to fed Roy off. “We run. He’ll follow us, no doubt about it. Save us energy and time.” That was the nice thing about red lanterns. You could chat your plans back and forth and they’d never know any different.
Roy growled, an energy beam shot towards the green thing twice before he got a hit. His moment of triumph shot at the sensation of something wrapping around him and binding his arms. He took a dumb moment to struggle and attempt to use his muscles to break out before he was crawling at the beam and throwing acid to make it disintegrate around him. Turning on the other green thing he mauled at the shield until it was cracking at the pounding of his fists and the blood seeping over it.
With one defiant roar, Roy continued his attempt to break the green bubbles, intent on reaching the green things inside so he could tear them apart.
Guy stepped up and kept behind a thick police-style riot shield, while he slammed at Roy repeatedly with a hefty medieval-style mace, trying to get Roy’s attention off of Hal. It had worked, and now Roy’s fury was facing him, and his back to Hal for just a moment.
The test pilot’s plan of a strategic retreat was sounding wiser by the second, and Guy opened his mouth to agree, when he spotted a familiar sight coming toward them, from behind Roy and Hal. He couldn’t help but grin.
“Hal, old buddy, hold that thought…oh, and ya might wanna stand a few paces to yer left…”
A tiny ball of green light sparked in the distance, growing larger and larger every instant as it flew toward the Lanterns. Their rings chimed with the words, “Heads down!”
A moment later, the construct missile crashed into the Red Lantern, sending them both reeling over the others. It fractured around the Red Lantern as its creator joined the others.
John grinned, “You having this party without me? Guess my invitation got lost in the mail.”
“John?!” Kyle flew over, almost about to hug him when Roy broke free again and they all /four/ of them worked in tandem to shove Roy a distance away again, giving the Lanterns some breathing time. “You never call, you never write…I was beginning to think you didn’t like us.”
There was so much more he wanted to say, but Roy was gathering up steam again to charge them.
“Well, let’s take this show on the road,” Kyle turned towards the direction of the jump point, ready to give Roy chase. If Kyle had any worries before, John’s arrival was enough to sweep them all away.
Guy was grinning from ear to ear as John fell into place with them, and hung back to construct a giant snow plow blade to drag behind them and shield the group from Roy’s red energy blasts as best he could. ”Aw, don’t listen to him, Johnny-boy, I’ve known for a long time ya didn’t like us!” he joked, and then added, as he continued to fly backwards, “Are you ever a sight for sore eyes!”
He got suddenly pushed further ahead by the shock of three consecutive blasts striking their plow-shield, and focused more energy at keeping it up. “Ahh, little help John or Hal? He’s one angry little cuss…” A fourth blast tore off a top corner of the shielding completely, and it was getting difficult to fly on course backwards while reinforcing a shield and moving it as Roy swerved and deked and bobbed to aim around it.
John laughed and flew level with Guy, adding his will to the shield, reinforcing it from the inside out. ”Hey, the only one allowed to hassle you three on my watch is /me/!”
A blast from Roy shook the shield and John fired off a quick jolt of power from it in retaliation. ”So, anyone want to explain what’s been happening here? Salaak just told me you three might be in more trouble than even you deserve.”
John was here…Well at least SOMETHING good was coming out of this madness. Hal almost smiled, making sure the way ahead was clear before falling back a bit.
“Kyle, take point,” he said with a nod. Circling, he elbowed John. “Nice of you to join us, partner.” It took a moment to assess the situation, but it was clear what needed to be done. They needed to knock Roy back and allow themselves just a bit of breathing room.
“Guys, pour on some speed.” Hal’s aura brightened a bit. “I’m gonna piss him off.”
A twin pair of fighter jets shot passed him, swooping close to Roy and buzzing passed his head. They circled around and flew straight at each other, crashing with Roy in the center. Hal was sure it wouldn’t hurt him too badly, and would DEFINITELY slow him down.
Roy didn’t know what they were doing, not that it mattered, he was after all filled with blind rage to kill all green things. Though with the newest addition to the group, Roy was certain he’d have all the time in the world to kill them. Not even a sensation of exhaustion was pulling over him, his body working like clockwork. It was almost like he couldn’t feel a thing. Each construct thrown his way was just something to distract him. Any wounds he sustains, are like bug bites to him. Irritating and just more reasons to take them out.
Letting out another roar of anger at the explosive constructs, Roy’s vision blurred before it focused and zoned in one particular lantern. He let out an unrelenting blast of red energy and acid blood until he was in rushing at Kyle, taking him out of the shielding in a matter of seconds. But he didn’t stop there, he just kept flying down with Kyle in tow, flying him away from the others, almost elated he manage to get a green thing all to himself. He punched Kyle in the face, a satisfactory sound of his mask breaking making Roy happy enough to stop his descent miles away from the others.
They couldn’t stop him now.
Kyle paused on the way there, floating mid-air as he looked at himself in a reflective surface along a hallway. He was fine. Guy was fine. Kate and Ollie were fine. Which meant Hal was fine. And as for Roy…well. They’d make him fine, whether he wanted it or not. He nodded and kept going, flying faster when he saw the two familiar green glows in the airlock.
“Sorry for being late,” he apologized by rote, and looked from one to the other. “Time to go?”
Guy shoved his fists is his pockets and glanced at Hal. “Time to go,” he agreed, briefly thinking back to the last time he and Kyle had to get all official like this before rolling out; it had been to track down and arrest a SeRVE member who had broken his parole terms, and one they’d both grown to like, personally.
Now, they had to go after an ally-turned-Red Lantern. A friend. The son of a close friend. When was their work as Green Lanterns going to start becoming satisfying, if not enjoyable, once again?
Hal had charged his ring up, and had been waiting for the other two at the airlock. Hands clasped behind his back, he floated just off the floor in a sort of parade rest, his mind working a hundred miles a minute. They had to find Roy, clean him up, and bring him how. Someone needed to chain that boy to the wall, and Hal himself had a good mind to, with all the grief Roy had caused Ollie of late.
When the other two had joined him, he nodded and punched the panel to open the lock.
“Let’s go.”
He pushed away from the platform, letting the other two join him before proceeding.
“We have to find him first, and he could be almost anywhere,” he said. “Safe bet…He’s headed for Ysmault. We have to catch him BEFORE he gets there…or we might lose him.” To his knowledge, there had never been a human member of the Red Lantern Corps (Guy notwithstanding). The Greens had been bad enough…what would Red be like?
“Y’know the way Roy was all this time, I wouldn’t be surprised if he was taking the scenic route to Ysmault,” Kyle said, boosting his will a bit to fly flush with the other two. This wasn’t the time for theatrics. “Plus I’ll bet with his lack of experience, he might just be burning fuel, like a Reaver ship when it’s hungry…” Kyle thumbed his ring thoughtfully.
“Ring, scan for traces of Red Lantern…energy burn? Rageerny? Angry exhaust? Fan and track the rage crumbs.”
Kyle’s ring sparked for a bit and then a series of green dots - not unlike bread crumbs - sprinkled a path to their left, stretching out into the distance. “Looks like he headed that way.” Hal was right. The path was jagged and schizophrenic, but it was definitely in the direction of the Red Lanterns base.
Guy managed to not chuckle as Kyle described what he needed from his ring. It was a good thing Kyle’s ring, as well as his closest colleagues, understood him clearly; Kyle’s speech patterns were sometimes as creative as his art was, and not everyone found it as endearing as Guy or Hal.
“So we make a beeline course there, while tracking Roy’s course, we’ll shave off even more time, an’ catch up all the sooner,” Guy agreed, as he ringed a similar beacon for them to follow that would run alongside Roy’s course, but far more directly bound for Ysmault.
“We got our course, now we just pour on the speed,” he said, pulling ahead slightly to get them started. “Anyone got a strategy for taking him down once we find him? I’m thinkin’ there’s three of us, two could keep ‘em busy, the third could grab him from behind, avoid the acid-blood?”
“Most important things are that we don’t get that napalm on us…and we try not to hurt him.” That was a tall order, especially with a manic Red Lantern. They were primal in the strictest sense, violent and wild, lashing out at anything or anyone who got near them. Hal was just thankful that Roy hadn’t been in full on rage yet when he’d found Ollie and Kate…otherwise…
Don’t think about that, he told himself. His aura burned a bit brighter as he took off, leaving a trail of green in his wake. He wasn’t feeling chatty right now. Normally banter would lighten a situation, but this…this just felt surreal.
“I hope no one else runs into him before we do..” he muttered, then glanced at the others. “Do we have a plan for healing him?”
“Mogo,” Kyle answered easily. He sped up, following a bit along Guy’s straighter course to Ysmault, then diverting along his own trail. Really, sped up so he could turn to glance at Guy and then Hal, as surreptitiously as he could. Truth was, he knew he should be nervous as hell, but he was damn tired of feeling that way. Of thinking about all the pieces of the puzzles, trying to fit them together, tie his feelings to Roy to Ollie to being nearly killed. To Kate and then to Hal. To Mia and Connor and Lian…that whole poor shattered little family…To Guy and to Red Lantern. To Jaime and his Khaji. To Dick and Wally, confused and hurt. It was too much to think about. Too much to get upset over; so the simple solution was to just not think about it at all, and focus on just one detail of the bigger picture: get Roy back.
“Guy got a hold of Salaak, and he contacted me a couple hours ago…” Wait…no was that a dream? No, no it couldn’t be. Kyle shook his head, clearing his throat. “Salaak said Mogo could sense something was wrong and he’s - it’s - preparing himself for our arrival. We just need to get Roy all packaged and FedExed by us. Once we’re down on Mogo, he’ll take care of Roy.” Like he took care of Guy, just…plopped him right into a healing slurry and then Guy went green again.
Green and gooey and…Kyle roughly shook his head again to get the sudden onslaught of bobbling thoughts out of his head…and suddenly came to a stop. He pointed. They were out of the solar system, where a cloud of comets were clouding through a strip of space…and among the space dust they could see a frenetic red glow, blood-colored globs tearing a swath through the passing comet trails.
Guy was trying to forget the reminder of his experience with Mogo; while he was close with the other lantern now, he could still remember the last moments of his healing, of leeches working at superfast speed to filter the napalm from his bloodstream. And heal they did, but they were still leeches, squirming into his nose, mouth, ears, even his throat and lungs. He shuddered at the memory, when Kyle pointed out their target.
Guy consulted his ring for confirmation. “Yeah…that’s Roy, all right. Can you guys keep him occupied while I try an’ tackle him from behind, or do either of ya have a better plan?” He looked first to his partner, then to Hal.
Hal stopped when Kyle pointed, nodding at the red gleam against black space. They were right, that erratic pattern hadn’t gotten him very far at all…all the better for them, really. Mulling over the “plan”, he licked his lips slowly, thinking.
”We need to cover his mouth,” he said. “That will cut down his danger significantly…Once you grab him,” he looked at Guy. “What do you plan to do with him? You can’t very well muscle him all the way to Mogo..”
“Short of getting Mogo to come to us, or fetching a Blue Lantern, It’s that, or we knock Roy out,” Guy replied, folding his arms. “I’m open to suggestions. Kyle, how did you guys finally get me subdued and delivered to Mogo?”
Kyle reflected Guy and folded his arms as well, leaning backwards into nothing. “Mogo was right there. At Oa. Mogo came to help us…” Kyle squinted at Roy in the distance, glad to have this almost odd little pocket of time to plan carefully. If it had been any another Red Lantern, these precautions were unnecessary. Take down by any means possible. But it wasn’t any Red Lantern - it was Roy. It was their friend. They needed to subdue, not attack. Kyle sucked his teeth as he thought.
“Jump points. There’s gotta be one around here somewhere. Salaak might know, then once we subdue Roy, we can just get Salaak to activate the jump point and boom - straight to Mogo.” Kyle flew a bit away so he could get in comms with Salaak, as the other two sorted out their plan for getting Roy safely constrained.
Nodding, Hal rolled his shoulders out a bit. He hated going into this without a real plan, but they didn’t have much choice. Red lanterns were dangerous and volatile, and took more than brute force or finesse to control. They took both. Lucky for him, he had a master of each on either side, so maybe this wouldn’t be impossible.
“Let’s go.”
On the comm, Salaak chastised Kyle for being out of his designated sector, but told him that there was a jump point not far from the sector house. It wasn’t close but it was better than nothing. In the interest of controlling a rogue red lantern, he was all too happy to make the proper arrangements. Notify the sector’s lanterns they were coming, make preparations for the jump and ensure they could get as close to Mogo as possible.
He also reminded Kyle that they ALL now “owed him one”, as the Earthers say.
In the process of flying for this long, space and its entirety should be a big thing. This should hold some sort of significance other than, ‘Oh gee look at all the stars!’ But it doesn’t and Roy doesn’t even look around to see where he’s going or hell, where he’s at. Instead he’s just a ball full of rage. Swiping at comets like he’s Babe Ruth and nothing matters except for the anger. It’s unflickering, fueling him to move forward and obey.
Deep down, the little boy inside of him is tearing at his inner walls. He just wants out. He just wants to get home, but this thing. This red light keeps dragging him back into the darkness. He knows..he knows what’s happening. He’s dying inside and this ring of power. It’s the only thing keeping him alive now. Spreading acid through his body like some conduit.
And at first he doesn’t feel anything. Just the comets whizzing by, the dust of the ones he obliterates and then suddenly he feels hostile. More than before but to the point that he’s entire body just jerks and turns around. Snarling with the acid spew coming out of his mouth in a likeness to a cat hissing, Roy sees Green and the only emotion that comes along with it is kill.
Oh god, look at him now. If Ollie were here, he’d smack some sense into him or tell him how silly it was to feel ‘kill’. ‘Don’t you know kid? You can’t feel your actions inside, that’s why they’re called actions. It’s what you do.’
“Owe him one?” Guy echoed as Kyle relayed Salaak’s words. “Why that pompous, gangly, bug-headed…” he began to rant as he turned to leave, and circle around behind their target as planned.
He brought himself up short, though, as he looked over and saw the distant red light cease in its smashing of comets and leave a trail of red light to show he was on the move again. He wasn’t moving away, however, but on a direct path towards the three of them. “Throw out the playbook, gents, he’s spotted us,” he pointed as he rejoined the team once more. “So much for the element of surprise.”
“So much,” Kyle said grimly, flying towards Roy with the others, erecting a shield to cover the other two as they took the offense. “Doesn’t change the plan. Restraining him’ll only last so long. We gotta do it fast and it’s gotta be as little force as possible…” As if. It had been hard enough restraining Guy for all of ten minutes, and that was at least six experienced Green Lanterns doing the job.
But no. No that wasn’t the way to think about it - Guy knew what it was like to be a Lantern; Roy had no clue. And there was something to be said about being a Green Lantern from Earth. Guy Gardner and Hal Jordan. Kilowog and John were the only other two who matched their abilities, in Kyle’s secret opinion. They could do this. They will do this.
Kyle flipped the shield and expanded it to enshroud all of them within a small globe; the hull was thick enough to withstand Roy’s blasts, if he tried - but Kyle was betting the red rage in him would be hell-bent on attacking, not escaping. Still, if they could manage to back him into a corner and pour green over him - like pouring plaster over a mold - Kyle was sure they’d be able to create a full-body encasement strong enough to buy the time it took to get to the jump point.
“Han Solo in carbonite,” Kyle said suddenly, and dodged a blast of red rage that Roy blasted out. “We just gotta overwhelm him, let him fight against that, while we concentrate on getting him to the jump—” The second time Roy red-blasted out, Kyle didn’t dodge in time. He slammed backwards into his own globular shield with a loud “OOF”
Hal wasted no time in throwing a lasso around Roy, hauling him backward to get him off of Kyle. He knew the Red Lantern could probably break the bond if he tried, but it bought Kyle precious seconds to get away. Of course, that also shifted Roy’s focus to HIM directly, and he had to move quickly to dodge his attacks.
“Got a last ditch idea,” he said, a large shield forming over his arms as he brought them up to fed Roy off. “We run. He’ll follow us, no doubt about it. Save us energy and time.” That was the nice thing about red lanterns. You could chat your plans back and forth and they’d never know any different.
Roy growled, an energy beam shot towards the green thing twice before he got a hit. His moment of triumph shot at the sensation of something wrapping around him and binding his arms. He took a dumb moment to struggle and attempt to use his muscles to break out before he was crawling at the beam and throwing acid to make it disintegrate around him. Turning on the other green thing he mauled at the shield until it was cracking at the pounding of his fists and the blood seeping over it.
With one defiant roar, Roy continued his attempt to break the green bubbles, intent on reaching the green things inside so he could tear them apart.
Guy stepped up and kept behind a thick police-style riot shield, while he slammed at Roy repeatedly with a hefty medieval-style mace, trying to get Roy’s attention off of Hal. It had worked, and now Roy’s fury was facing him, and his back to Hal for just a moment.
The test pilot’s plan of a strategic retreat was sounding wiser by the second, and Guy opened his mouth to agree, when he spotted a familiar sight coming toward them, from behind Roy and Hal. He couldn’t help but grin.
“Hal, old buddy, hold that thought…oh, and ya might wanna stand a few paces to yer left…”
A tiny ball of green light sparked in the distance, growing larger and larger every instant as it flew toward the Lanterns. Their rings chimed with the words, “Heads down!”
A moment later, the construct missile crashed into the Red Lantern, sending them both reeling over the others. It fractured around the Red Lantern as its creator joined the others.
John grinned, “You having this party without me? Guess my invitation got lost in the mail.”
“John?!” Kyle flew over, almost about to hug him when Roy broke free again and they all /four/ of them worked in tandem to shove Roy a distance away again, giving the Lanterns some breathing time. “You never call, you never write…I was beginning to think you didn’t like us.”
There was so much more he wanted to say, but Roy was gathering up steam again to charge them.
“Well, let’s take this show on the road,” Kyle turned towards the direction of the jump point, ready to give Roy chase. If Kyle had any worries before, John’s arrival was enough to sweep them all away.
Guy was grinning from ear to ear as John fell into place with them, and hung back to construct a giant snow plow blade to drag behind them and shield the group from Roy’s red energy blasts as best he could. ”Aw, don’t listen to him, Johnny-boy, I’ve known for a long time ya didn’t like us!” he joked, and then added, as he continued to fly backwards, “Are you ever a sight for sore eyes!”
He got suddenly pushed further ahead by the shock of three consecutive blasts striking their plow-shield, and focused more energy at keeping it up. “Ahh, little help John or Hal? He’s one angry little cuss…” A fourth blast tore off a top corner of the shielding completely, and it was getting difficult to fly on course backwards while reinforcing a shield and moving it as Roy swerved and deked and bobbed to aim around it.
John laughed and flew level with Guy, adding his will to the shield, reinforcing it from the inside out. ”Hey, the only one allowed to hassle you three on my watch is /me/!”
A blast from Roy shook the shield and John fired off a quick jolt of power from it in retaliation. ”So, anyone want to explain what’s been happening here? Salaak just told me you three might be in more trouble than even you deserve.”
John was here…Well at least SOMETHING good was coming out of this madness. Hal almost smiled, making sure the way ahead was clear before falling back a bit.
“Kyle, take point,” he said with a nod. Circling, he elbowed John. “Nice of you to join us, partner.” It took a moment to assess the situation, but it was clear what needed to be done. They needed to knock Roy back and allow themselves just a bit of breathing room.
“Guys, pour on some speed.” Hal’s aura brightened a bit. “I’m gonna piss him off.”
A twin pair of fighter jets shot passed him, swooping close to Roy and buzzing passed his head. They circled around and flew straight at each other, crashing with Roy in the center. Hal was sure it wouldn’t hurt him too badly, and would DEFINITELY slow him down.
Roy didn’t know what they were doing, not that it mattered, he was after all filled with blind rage to kill all green things. Though with the newest addition to the group, Roy was certain he’d have all the time in the world to kill them. Not even a sensation of exhaustion was pulling over him, his body working like clockwork. It was almost like he couldn’t feel a thing. Each construct thrown his way was just something to distract him. Any wounds he sustains, are like bug bites to him. Irritating and just more reasons to take them out.
Letting out another roar of anger at the explosive constructs, Roy’s vision blurred before it focused and zoned in one particular lantern. He let out an unrelenting blast of red energy and acid blood until he was in rushing at Kyle, taking him out of the shielding in a matter of seconds. But he didn’t stop there, he just kept flying down with Kyle in tow, flying him away from the others, almost elated he manage to get a green thing all to himself. He punched Kyle in the face, a satisfactory sound of his mask breaking making Roy happy enough to stop his descent miles away from the others.
They couldn’t stop him now.