#10: "CRISIS #2" End of an Era (Kruger / Borize)

Chapter 2: Invasion!

The Earth shook violently beneath his feet as he stared up at the planet’s newest satellite.

It was unlike anything he had ever seen before. It was black as cinder, at least twice the size of the moon, with flames vomiting from pits that pocked its surface. It seemed to radiate evil and oppression. He lifted off the ground to put distance between himself and the shaking ground.

Hal looked down at his ring, it glowed brighter than ever, occasionally sparking energy. Was it overloading?

“Run diagnostic.” He ordered the ring.

{Diagnostic complete, functioning at 125% capacity without usual power drain.} Abin Sur’s voice responded, catching Hal off guard. The ring hadn’t responded to him verbally for some time, the answers he sought usually popped into his head.

“Contact OA, we may need backup.”

{No contact established, no further information available.}

“Great.” Hal replied as he flew toward Coast City. He wanted to ask the ring for more information, but he didn’t want to waste any more time than he already had. Coast City had stopped shaking for the moment, but the damage had already been done! The city was a disaster zone.

Some of the older buildings had collapsed, those that were built within the last 30 years or so still stood, though many were damaged beyond repair. Many bridges had collapsed and sink-holes had formed in the streets below. Fires burned from broken gas lines and electrical wires writhed and slithered along the ground sparking and spitting energy like vipers fighting over a meal. There hadn’t been a quake this strong in the region since the San Francisco quake of 1906.

Everywhere he looked people began to help each other out of dangerous situations. Hal smiled to himself, no matter what others thought of Californians, when the chips were down they fought tooth and nail to keep each other alive.

The ground began shaking again with a large scale aftershock. Hal launched himself toward the Tyler Building which seemed precariously balanced. He moved so fast through streets that he broke the sound barrier, shattering windows and over-shooting the building in the process. He glanced down at his ring again… something was not right. He concentrated, focusing his energy on getting to the building this time.

The Tyler Building had, over its long history, been many things, but at that moment it was low-income housing. Using his ring he willed large emerald support beams up to hold the building steady while the ground shook. Unfortunately the shaking did not subside. The Coast City Bridge that spanned Redwood Bay wrenched itself free of its moorings, sending several cars plummeting toward the ocean below. Hal caught the falling cars in a large cushion while keeping the supports steady on the Tyler building. He gently lowered the cars into an empty park as the shaking subsided.

“Attention everyone!” He amplified his voice with a bull-horn construct and called out to the tenants of the Tyler building, “Find the nearest window and evacuate the building!”

Instantly every window had a transparent green slide sitting just beneath their sills. Men, women and children poured from the windows, sliding into large cushions below. He moved the crowds a distance away from the building before de-rezzing the supports. Luckily the building stood. But if another quake hit, it would definitely fall. That thought brought Hal’s attention back to the Earth’s new moon.

The sudden appearance of the fire-pit covered sphere was certainly the cause of the quakes… but something else now grabbed his attention. Thousands, perhaps millions of small figures and ships flew from the Hellish planet toward Earth.

It was an invasion!

Chapter 4: Wave of Mutilation

Screams snapped Hal back to reality. He sped toward its source at Kane Beach, but quickly saw why someone had screamed. A wall of sea water over 200 feet high raced toward shore at an astonishing speed. He landed on the beach staring at the water as it seemed to reach over him toward the city’s already crippled skyscrapers. Most people screamed and ran, some stared in shock at the scene unsure of what to do. An air of hopelessness seemed to be taking hold of the people of Coast City.

“GO!” Hal shouted at them. “RUN AS FAR AWAY AS YOU CAN!!!”

Hal turned back to the shore, the water line had receded at least a quarter mile from where it should have been. He dug his heels into the sand, unsure if it would help, but it felt like the right thing to do. He stuck out his ringed right hand, braced it with his left, and focused his willpower through the jewel in the center of his power ring.

With a thunderous roar emerald energy surged out instantly forming a barrier between the city and the sea. An image of the Hoover Dam came to mind and his ring obliged, creating a near replica, easily fifty times the size of the real thing.

He waited for the water to hit, as sweat began to bead on his forehead. From nowhere a memory of his father came to him.

He was helping his father clear out the rain gutters in their old house on Milton Dr. … more like Hal held onto the ladder while his dad did the real work.

“Now something you should always… remember… Hal,” His father strained reaching for a handful of rain soaked leaves, “Water will always find a way through. Always. If there is a way, it’ll find it…. See? The gutter here was completely socked in. Look over there.”

Marty pointed toward the other end of the gutter where water poured from the top onto the ground below.

“Take away the obstacle and it flows where it’s naturally supposed to go!” Marty said as he tossed the wad of leaves onto Hal’s head with a chuckle. The water began flowing properly again. “You know what this means, Hal?”

Hal shook his head ‘no’.

“It means that Jack has been shirking his chores again!”

Hal quickly imagined a siphon that would force the wall of water away from the city and back into the ocean where it belonged. He adjusted his dam of green adding a sharper curve to it. He then expanded the length of the wall an additional mile in either direction. From space, from Apokolips… the dam resembled an enormous emerald horseshoe.

Hal had only a second before it hit. He braced himself for the impact.

Chapter 6: Pounding Surf

The force of the impact nearly knocked him off his feet. Luckily, at the last moment, he drove six foot long emerald spikes into the beach sand, attaching them to his waist, anchoring himself to the Earth.

The roar of the water was deafening and his muscles burned from the strain.

He held his ground. He would not let the city… his city die.

Sweat poured from his forehead, down his mask, into his eyes, down his nose, into his mouth. His eyes burned. The salty taste of the sweat on his tongue, a not-so subtle reminder of what would happen if he failed.

He would not fail.

After what seemed like an eternity the resistance of the water lessened. The roar dimmed. He stood there with the dam in place long after the threat had passed. All he could hear other than the blood pumping through his ears was his rhythmic breathing. The pounding lessened revealing the sound of seagulls. Then the crowd behind him began to cheer. He had been so intent on stopping the wave that he had forgotten the civilians behind him.

He lowered his arms as the barrier faded. The wall of bright green replaced by an oddly serene ocean. A slight mist hung in the late afternoon air… the only sign that things had been even slightly out of place.

The crowd surged around him, hugging him, patting him on the shoulder, shaking his hands… not the first time he had received such a reception, but certainly not a welcome one. All he wanted to do was collapse from exhaustion.

He looked up at the planet in orbit and squinted as it began to eclipse the Sun. There would be no rest for the wicked that day…

Chapter 8: Kalibak Strikes!

A small spot appeared in the sky. It seemed to be falling from the planet above. Was it a piece of debris? Anything was possible… One thing was sure, it was headed his way.

“Everyone back away, quickly!” Hal ordered the crowd. “Get back!”

He took off into the air to meet the new threat head-on. As he drew closer the object quickly began to take shape. It was humanoid… it held something in its hand… and it was very pissed off.

“RRRAAARRRGGGHHH!!!” It howled furiously as it fell.

Hal surrounded himself in a large protective bubble as the two collided in mid-air! The force of their collision shattered the protective bubble.

The creature swung its weapon wildly at Hal’s head as it fell past him. Hal easily dodged the swing and watched astonished as it plummeted to its doom.

“What the Hell was that?” Hal asked himself… he contemplated for a moment just letting it hit the ground. He couldn’t do that though. Besides, it wouldn’t surprise him if the bruiser survived. He quickly began to chase after it.

He scooped up the falling madman before he slammed into the ground and killed himself, or more importantly, someone else. It continued to swing its weapon at Hal’s constructs. Each blow of the odd weapon cracked Hal’s constructs! The weapon looked like a small jet engine with a handle and it pulsed with an electric energy.

The creature fell the remaining 20 feet, landing on its head and creating a small crater on Fox St. Hal landed just outside the crater and cautiously peered in. Maybe he’d been wrong about the monster... It launched itself suddenly out of the crater toward Hal, swinging its weapon wildly again.

“I am Kalibak! Son of My Lord Darkseid, ruler of Apokolips and I will destroy you, Guardian-Pawn, for honor and glory!” With Kalibak’s lengthy introduction, came a blow with every emphasized word.

Hal’s ring did it’s best to protect him from each blow, but each strike hurt like Hell.

Hal let loose a destructive beam of energy that struck Kalibak in the face sending him flying end over end through the wall of Coast City’s Lowe’s. Hal dropped to his knees exhausted and sore. First there was Dr. Polaris, then a giant wave and then this guy. Not to mention that his ring was still acting oddly.

“HAHAHAHAHAHAAAA! Is that the best you’ve got, Earthling?” Kalibak shouted as he stepped out of the store.

Hal stood again, brining himself up to full his full height. It was the first time he‘d actually seen the beast. He had a large, stocky body, and an incredibly large head surrounded by a lion‘s mane of black hair. He had large canine teeth, huge eyes and tree trunk sized arms that nearly hung to the ground. His outfit was yellow (not that it mattered anymore) and blue, covered in strange circles. The creature was pure primal rage.

“If that is the best the Green Lantern Corps can do, it is no wonder they were destroyed so easily!” Kalibak goaded.

“Try me again, Kali--- Wait, what?”

Chapter 10: Green Lantern Strikes Back!

It couldn’t be… all that talk about the Corps being around for billions of years keeping Earth, Hell, every planet safe. Impossible!

Hal’s concentration was off as his thoughts went wild. Kalibak seemed to notice and continued to pound at him furiously. The monster spat out sentences that made little sense. About high fathers and Orion’s and genesis. Two things he kept repeating were the apocalypse and his father ‘Lord Dark-side’. It all seemed to come back to him. Kalibak had daddy issues.

Hal focused his full attention on the alien warrior once again, pushing thoughts of OA and the Corps out of his mind. If OA was destroyed, there was little he could do about it anyway. If he was the last Green Lantern, then he would make damn sure Kilowog and the Corps would be remembered!

“My father’s throne will be adorned with your skeleton for decoration! He will wear your power ring around his neck! Your head will be mounted on a pike in the gran…”

“NNNYYYAAARRRGGGHHH!!!” Hal screamed as he unleashed a wild blast of uninhibited emerald energy. The beam poured out from the ring’s jewel in a torrent not unlike the tsunami he’d protected his city from. Every milliliter of Oan energy was aimed directly at Kalibak. Hal was unsure if the blast would kill the monster, but at that point, when his rage took hold, he didn’t care. This beast, this monster would just as soon kill every being on Earth just to please his father. Hal continued to put everything he had into the blast… the ring burned Hal’s black gloved hand. He would not relent as long as an ounce of energy remained. Then he might just throw whatever power his battery had at Kalibak just for good measure. Either way, the evil bastard was going down.

Epilogue 1:

An underground bunker.

I open my eyes. It feels as though it’s the first time. I’m disoriented at first as I see the fluid that engulfs me. I look down, I am naked except for the tube that provides me with air and sustenance. This is unacceptable! There are lights in the room surrounding me. It is a crude laboratory of some sort.

Think… where was I? What happened? I look to my right hand… nothing where my ring once was.

I close my eyes to concentrate, but I fear that I will not be able to open them again. They snap open again suddenly. I fear? I do not know fear! Fear is beneath me…

What has happened to me? I begin to panic. I thrash around trying to break the clear tube that I float in, but nothing happens. Then I see her… a female of another species. She approaches my prison a look of fear on her face.

Yes! Fear me! I do not fear you!

She runs for an object on her desk and begins to speak into it. A few moments later a man enters the room. He wears a formal suit of some kind. His hair is white, with a streak of black. He approaches the tube with a dark look in his eyes. He is not afraid. He knows I am defenseless. He pushes a button on my prison and I hear his voice.

“Well hello there friend. Welcome back to the land of the living! I am Director Faraday, and you are?”

Without my ring I cannot understand him.

I will kill you little man. Once the Guardians free me, Sinestro will kill you.