PROLOGUE TWO
To understand the next part of our story, it is necessary to explain why certain individuals involved with the Secret Society came to Earth in the first place. In order to understand those events, it is necessary to explain some of the background of the group of cosmic law enforcers called the Green Lantern Corps.
As was noted before, New Genesis and Apokolips do not exist within normal space, as most sentient beings know it. Rather, they exist in another dimension that is not only outside of normal space, but outside of time as well, allowing the “gods” on these worlds to look down upon the various multiple universes and alternate timelines that exist, separate but linked to one another, at will and observe what goes on. Travel between the worlds of the New Gods and normal space and time is possible, through the invention of a unique travel mode called the Boom Tube. This tunnel of energy, capable of connecting any point in space and time with either New Genesis or Apokolips, was invented many years ago by a New Genesis native named Metron. It is through the Boom Tube technology that Gorgon, of Apokolips, traveled to Earth (and some other non-Earthly locations) to issue the “invitations” that would gather together the Secret Society of Super-Villains.
Another pertinent fact about the dual worlds of the New Gods is that the mighty explosion that tore one uber-planet apart and caused the formation of two new worlds also unleashed a powerful cosmic energy surge from the Source itself…the Source being the majestic wellspring of the Creator’s power that even the “old gods” respected, feared and worshipped. This “godwave” swept through normal space and touched many worlds, affecting them in many different ways. One world touched by the “godwave” was the nascent planet Earth, which saw its dominant mammalian life form…the race of primates that would evolve into the human race…blessed with the metagene, a genetic “x-factor” that would, in times of stress or near-death, allow human beings to manifest super-human powers.
Another world touched by the “godwave” was the otherwise barren rock called Oa. This nearly dead world was suddenly permeated with Source energy, so much so that it would soon become a focal point of power and justice for the entire universe. Ever since Oa became inundated with the Source energy, it has glowed a deep green.
Some years after the “godwave” swept over Oa, the otherwise still barren planet became host to its first visitors in many centuries. These visitors came from the planet Maltus.
Maltus, a planet much like Earth is now, was one of the first planets in the universe to achieve sentient humanoid life. Through the eons of its existence, the people of Maltus solved the mysteries of every disease and life-threatening ailment they could find…to the point where they became functionally immortal. Ultimately, this led to massive overcrowding and a disastrous strain on the planet’s limited resources. Thus, a decision was made to seek out other planets that the Maltusians could colonize, and thus relieve the burdens on their homeworld. It was one of these colonization exploration ships that discovered Oa.
Once there, the Maltusians quickly discovered the strange green energy that suffused the planet. Although Oa was not, at that time, suitable for colonization, the Maltusians did realize that Oa had a scientific value that made it worth further study, and so they elected to abandon their search for planets that a portion of the Maltus population could move to in order to explore Oa’s mysteries more fully. The Maltusians then found that the longer they stayed on Oa, the more the green energy would affect their own bodies, turning their skin a pale blue. Since it seemed to have no other ill effect, the Maltusians ignored this and continued their studies.
The Maltusians also soon found that they could manipulate the green energy with their minds, ultimately finding a way to commune with the power. They marveled at the things they could now do…they could travel to other worlds without space ships, using the green energy to propel and protect them; they could create objects from the green energy with their minds, and make the objects do whatever they willed them to do; and more. By this time, they had decided to make Oa their permanent new home, and from then on they began to call themselves Oans instead of Maltusians. They also sent word of their findings back to Maltus, asking to be left alone to their continued studies. Since Oa had no native plant life, and therefore no natural food to support colonists, the Maltusians chose to accept this turn of events. And since the green energy on Oa served to nourish them better than food ever did, the Oans simply stopped eating when their ship's supplies ran out.
Back on Oa, the Source energy was only too happy to allow the former Maltusians to manipulate it and work with it to their hearts content, and told them so. The Source energy asked only one thing of them: that in their scientific research, they must not ever probe into the origins of the universe itself. The Source did not explain why this edict was given…only that it must be obeyed, or dire consequences would result.
The Oans were mystified by this demand, but for the most part were content to live with it. There were plenty of other areas of scientific interest to explore that the Source had not put limits on, and that was enough to keep the Oans happy. All, that is, but one.
One of the Oans, named Krona, bristled at being told that they could not learn how the universe itself came into existence. He saw no harm in learning such a thing, and as he brooded, his intellectual curiosity soured and turned into resentment and anger. He
finally decided that he would learn this secret or die in the trying, and everything else be damned.
In secret, Krona spent several months working on a scanner that would pierce the veils of time itself. When it was finally completed, he immediately set it for the beginnings of the universe. Before he could see anything, however, a powerful bolt of lightning came down from the green-tinged heavens above Oa, striking Krona and his time scanner dead-on. Krona was knocked unconscious for hours, and the time scanner was completely destroyed.
The Source energy surrounding the planet darkened, and all the other Oans gathered round to learn what was the matter. They were told of Krona’s actions, and of the consequences that had resulted.
Prior to this point, normal space had never had to worry about the concept of evil…the Creator had ensured that each world that had life had enough resources to take care of that life, so such wicked concepts as greed, jealousy, anger and hatred had not been needed or wanted. Even on Maltus, where resources were stretched to their thinnest, no one had yet gone hungry or turned to evil acts to get more than their share. But now, Krona’s time-scanning had briefly opened a portal between normal space and the extra-dimensional realm where the “gods” lived, and the evil of the gods of Apokolips had entered normal space. Once there, that evil would breed in the hearts and minds of sentient beings like wildfire, never to be stopped again.
The Oans were horrified by the very concepts of such evil, and heartsick that it was one of their own who had tainted the universe with it. They begged the Source to tell them what they could do to set things right. The Source told them that although there was no way to put the genie of evil back in its bottle, the Oans could do the next best thing: see to it that the evil was met by an equal, if not greater, force for good. Thus it was that the Oans now became the Guardians of the Universe. They created a gigantic battery, shaped like a lantern, to tap into the Source energy infesting the planet, and after some eons of experimenting with a robotic force of field agents called the Manhunters, the Guardians elected to create a squadron of sentient living beings to do this work, called the Green Lantern Corps. The Corps took its name from the smaller batteries they used to fuel their Power Rings, and the smaller batteries in turn were modeled after the larger one on Oa.
The Guardians divided up the known universe into space sectors, assigning a different Green Lantern to each one. As often as possible, the Green Lantern assigned to a given sector was one who made his or her home on a planet within that sector. It happens that on the Guardians’ massive chart, the planet Earth falls neatly into sector 2814.
Since the Guardians began using sentient living beings as their Green Lantern Corps, many of these Green Lanterns have either died in battle or retired after reaching a certain age. By the time DeSaad sent Gorgon to cull together the Secret Society of Super-Villains, the Green Lantern for sector 2814 was an Earthman named Hal Jordan.
Jordan resided in Coast City, California. Though he was now between jobs, he had held many over the years…from test pilot to insurance agent to toy salesman. As a test pilot, he had worked for Ferris Aircraft, a company started by the bombastic Carl Ferris and then inherited by his headstrong daughter Carol, who had dated Hal from time to time.
Carol herself had an alter ego of note: she had, for a time, been a villainess called Star Sapphire, whose powers came from a fantastic gem mined on the distant planet Zamora. The Zamorans had chosen Carol to be one of their queens, and had tried to alter her personality to give her more queen-like qualities, but it had made her schizophrenic instead. After her last defeat by Green Lantern Hal Jordan, Carol had hidden her costume and star sapphire gem away and then blocked the information from her memory. That was supposed to have been the last of Star Sapphire, but that would soon prove not to be the case.
Fourteen space sectors away from Jordan’s jurisdiction was sector 2828, where, living as a part of a star-spanning caravan, a humanoid male with deep blue skin named Gretti served as the sector’s Green Lantern. Though he and Jordan had met once or twice before, Gretti had never been to Earth or anywhere near Jordan’s sector. Nothing personal in that; it was just one of those things that never came about. Sadly, it was destined never to come about at all.
The day after DeSaad issued his instructions to Gorgon, while disguised as their master Darkseid, Gretti had been patrolling his space sector when he found himself ambushed
near the seventh moon of the planet Maxell V. A beam of yellow energy struck him savagely from behind, piercing the sheath of green energy from his Power Ring that had been protecting him from the cold vacuum of space, and searing his flesh.
As soon as the golden beam faded, Gretti’s ring automatically restored the protective field of energy and once more provided him with air to breathe, allowing him to rest and catch his breath somewhat. As he floated dizzily in space, he managed to turn around and see his attacker. The sight made his blood run cold, for it was someone he recognized all too well.
The being that floated in space before him had red skin, dark hair, and a mustache. He wore spandex-like tights made of a blue-black material, with pale blue cuffs at strategic points along each wrist, elbow and shoulder, and along the ankles, knees and thighs. A pair of pink trunks and a set of pale-blue boots completed the ensemble. And oh, yes: his right hand was adorned with a Power Ring similar to Gretti’s, except that this ring was made from a metal infused with a pale yellow energy.
He was Sinestro, a former member of the Green Lantern Corps hailing from the planet Korugar. Although he had started his career as heroically as any other member of the Corps, after a time he had let his power corrupt him, to the point where he was banned from the Green Lanterns and exiled to the anti-matter universe of Qward. There, he had struck an evil alliance with the Weaponers, the rulers of the planet Qward, and they had supplied him with a Power Ring of their own…one that charged itself by coming into proximity with an Oan Power Ring, and which took advantage of the Oan ring’s yellow impurity to turn ambient cosmic energy into a yellow power beam nearly the equal of the Source energy used by the Green Lanterns.
The exact mechanics of how the ring worked were far too technical for Sinestro to bother with, but as long as it worked, he didn’t really care. All he really cared about was getting revenge on his former fellow Corps members and on the Guardians. And now, he was about to strike another one down.
Grinning wickedly, Sinestro willed his Power Ring to create a series of clamps that held Gretti fast, allowing him no way to move or free himself. He then willed forth a makeshift firing squad of six rifles, each one aimed squarely at Gretti’s heart. Relishing the moment, Sinestro counted down as he had seen the humans of the planet Earth do on occasion: “Ready….Aim…FIRE!”
The guns discharged silently, since the vacuum of space circumvented any noise. But even without sound, they did their deadly work with pinpoint accuracy. The yellow energy bullets tore through Gretti’s green energy shield as if it wasn’t even there, penetrating his chest and tearing his heart to shreds. The noble Green Lantern slumped, mortally wounded.
As he did so, Sinestro allowed the clamps and the rifles to fade from existence. There was no need for them anymore, so it was pointless to waste further energy maintaining them.
Before the renegade Green Lantern from the planet Korugar could leave the area, however, he was surprised by the sudden opening of a Boom Tube several yards away. From the Tube came a small drone-ship, heading straight for Sinestro. The villain used his ring to create a shield, to deflect the drone, and prepared to draw a bead on it so that he could destroy it. But before he could do either one, the drone stopped and addressed him.
“Sinestro of Korugar?” the drone’s mechanical voice transmitted, knowing that Sinestro would pick up the transmission signal and translate it so that he could understand it, even through the vacuum of space.
“I am he,” Sinestro replied cautiously.
Without missing a beat, the drone continued its transmission. “I come bearing a message. You are invited to attend the first meeting of the Secret Society of Super-Villains, to be held in one week’s time on the planet Earth, in the city of San Francisco, California. Should you accept the invitation, the proper address and coordinates will be supplied directly to your Power Ring.”
At first, Sinestro’s inclination was to refuse. However, a trip to Earth would give him another shot at his most hated Green Lantern foe, Hal Jordan…the only member of the Corps to defeat him in battle, and more than once. And, after all, he could always leave again after the meeting, if he chose.
“Very well,” Sinestro said at last. “Inform your master that I accept the invitation.” The drone paused momentarily, then fulfilled its promise to give Sinestro’s ring directions on how to get to the Secret Society’s headquarters. Once the transmission was finished, the drone turned and retreated back through the Boom Tube. Sinestro watched it go, then turned and blew Gretti a good-bye kiss before streaking off in the direction of sector 2814 and the planet Earth.
Gretti, not quite dead yet but fading fast, watched all this helplessly. His own ring had also picked up the conversation between Sinestro and the drone, and he knew that if Sinestro was heading for Earth, his comrade Hal Jordan was in big trouble. He tried desperately to summon the strength to repair his damaged heart and to transmit a message to Oa, so that they could warn Jordan…but the pain was so great, and the damage so severe, that his struggles were futile. All he could manage was a weak distress call to whomever might be listening nearby.
In that, at least, some good luck was with him. Three light-years away, a starship picked up the weak SOS and headed over to Gretti’s coordinates.
The ship was piloted by a man who, by an odd coincidence, was himself originally from the planet Earth. His name at birth had been Adam Blake…but for a while, the general public had known him as Captain Comet, a super-powered hero who had temporarily followed in the footsteps of the Justice Society and the All Star Squadron of the 1940’s.
Born at the same time that a strange comet had passed close by the Earth, Blake had been somehow moved up the evolutionary scale and had powers that, someday, all humans will be able to achieve. He could fly, read minds, and had super-human strength, as well as a genius level intellect. As an adult, he had chosen to use these gifts to help mankind as the heroic Capt. Comet…but after a time, he felt that there were more important things he could be putting his powers to use for, and set out to explore deep space. He had not been back to Earth since.
Within moments, Blake’s ship found Gretti, and he lost no time in bringing the wounded Green Lantern aboard. Once there, the dying Gretti quickly conveyed to Blake what had
happened to him and who was responsible…and the fact that Sinestro was now on his way to Earth. As the story was related, Blake used his ship’s medical facilities to try to save the Emerald Warrior’s life, but it was no use. Gretti had lost too much blood, and Blake had none in supply that would work on Gretti’s race.
As Gretti breathed his last, his Power Ring flew from his finger of its own accord, leaving Blake’s ship and returning to Oa, as it was programmed to do. Morosely, Blake placed Gretti’s body into a hollow tube and jettisoned it into the nearby sun, quietly grieving to himself over the loss of a galactic hero.
Blake knew, though, that he could allow himself precious little time for mourning. Although he had never met Sinestro before, Blake had encountered members of the Green Lantern Corps in his space travels, and they had told him of the renegade from Korugar. Blake now knew all too well the evil that Sinestro was capable of, and he was determined that such evil would not be allowed to imperil his own homeworld. He immediately set a new course for Earth.