"So, when are we going to see the Corps about my GL status?" Cyra asked through a mouthful of donuts.
Hal was chilling with Cyra on top of a large donut, eating from boxes of dozen as the sun slowly set across Coast City. After stopping a hostage bank robbery situation and saving a cat from King Shark, it's been a stressful day and they decided that donuts seemed to be the best answer. The Green Lantern was slightly shocked by the area of conversation. Whenever Hal talked about her future as a Green Lantern before, she turned him down. Despite her talk, Hal could tell that Cyra didn't want to leave Earth.
"After the whole Injustice League, I thought you could use a break," Hal shrugged.
"I feel fine," Cyra said. "Plus, when will there be a better time?"
"I guess you're right. We'll go soon, I promise. I want to get in contact with John first, so we can all go together."
"What do I have to do?"
"It's just an examination. They will test your skills and then from there, they'll decide if you should keep your ring."
"I know that." Cyra rolled her eyes. "I meant—what is the test going to be? Saving a planet from annihilation? Destroying some big bad? Finding gold? What?"
"I don't know," Hal admitted. "This is the first time they ever have done this before. Who knows what they'll throw at you."
Seeing Cyra's slightly paler face, Hal tried to comfort her. "But you're young. I'm sure it won't be too bad. Nothing you can't handle."
Cyra forced a smirk to her face. "They can't handle this. Best Green Lantern in history coming through!"
They laughed together, but it was more like a habit. They continued to eat together in silence, occasionally asking for a napkin and burping, but besides that, it was a peaceful quiet.
"How do you think it'll be like?" Cyra asked, her arms behind her head as she looked up at the brilliant night sky. "Living off of Earth? You think I'll be assigned to a planet like this one?"
Hal sat up. "Who says you won't be assigned to Earth?"
Cyra just shrugged and after a moment of analyzing his sidekick, Hal laid back down. "I don't know. I never had to. I'm sure you're get assigned to Earth though. You're just a kid, they won't take you away from your home." Hal's voice got quieter when he repeated, "You're just a kid."
"I think it would be cool," Cyra stated. "Maybe I'll get stuck on a planet full of golden retrievers or where there is no crime, so I can just chill at a beach somewhere sipping on those fancy drinks with the little umbrellas."
"You don't want to stay on Earth?" Hal asked, his voice sounding more hostile than he wanted.
Cyra winced. "Of course I do! But if they are going to kick me off, I might as well look forward to it, yeah?"
Yet again, the older Lantern was shocked by his young protegee. He expected her to go out kicking and screaming. When they reassigned her, Hal expected Cyra to fight. To go out kicking in screaming about how she wanted to stay home. This quiet acceptance is not who he knew.
But then again, Hal thought. Cyra wanted to be a Green Lantern. She understands the duty. If the Corps decided that somewhere else needed her more, she'd do it.
Hal wished she'd just kick and scream instead of being so complicated.
"Plus, Earth isn't all that great," Cyra went on thoughtfully. "All these heroes and villains constantly fighting. Wars, famine, disease. This place is pretty messed up. It'll only get worse."
"What are you talking about?" Hal demanded, sitting up again. "No matter how bad it gets, we can handle it. We always do. And what about your family and your friends?"
Cyra wouldn't meet his brown gaze.
Hal continued, "And your future? What about school. A job? You said you wanted to be a pilot."
"I only said that because you were a pilot," Cyra said quietly and Hal's heart started to ache in his chest.
"What do you want to be then?" Hal's sad voice sent arrows into Cyra's heart.
"I don't know," Cyra admitted. "I don't really want to be anything."
It was a lie. The hurt look on Hal's face only made it worse. She couldn't even look at him.
Cyra did know what she wanted to be.
She wanted to be a Green Lantern.
Before Hal could open his mouth to respond to his protégées new attitude, his ring buzzed. He gave her a 'we'll-talk-about-this-later' look and turned away, holding his ring up to his ear like a cell phone. Cyra couldn't make out what was being said, but it was quick and Hal soon pulled his ring down from his ear.
"That was the Guardians," Hal sighed, referring to the Guardians of the Universe, AKA the strongest beings ever who gave both of the Green Lantern's their rings, AKA the people who knew everything. Extra AKA, the people who only called when there was major trouble stirring. "They said there are Manhunters on Earth."
A fire went off in Cyra's amber eyes as she leaped up, grinning. "Manhunters? Are you serious? The big bad robocops of the Universe? On Earth?" Cyra was practically squealing like a superhero fangirl who reads fanfiction online from excitement. "Dang that's amazing! I mean—it's totally not because that means their going to kill someone, but I get to stop them!" Cyra pumped her arms in the air. "Hella cool!"
"Cyra," Hal frowned, trying to play the serious mentor (say, Batman). "Manhunters are a big deal. They kill out of what they see as justice. They are powerful and almost unstoppable to anyone that isn't a Green Lantern. We have to find them and to do so, we have to find their targets and take them to safety before they get hurt."
By hurt, he meant killed.
"Or," Cyra tried, "we could take the targets to a safe place, which the Manhunter can also coincidentally find, and then trap the Manhunter in and take him down!"
"Cyra! No! We can't put the innocents in danger. That's who we're supposed to be saving!" Hal exclaimed, his puppy brown eyes wide beneath his Green Lantern mask. He spoke as if Cyra had heard this all before (which she had). "It's not all about fighting the bad guy. It's about saving people."
"I know that!" Cyra defended herself. "But if there were no bad people, then people wouldn't need saving. It's not like the Manhunters will ever stop. You told me they were determined hunters and trackers that don't stop until they complete their goal—or die."
Hal pursed her lips. She was right, but he hated that she was.
"We can talk more about this later, but for now, we have to try and find that Manhunter before the worse happens." Hal pushed off the ground, now enveloped in soft green light. Cyra followed his lead.
From the ground, civilians would have sworn they saw two green streaks trek over the sky in seconds before disappearing into the horizon. Some say it might have been flying comets, or airplanes, or even a very big green bird (people have certainly seen weirder), but that would be if a tourist was watching. To the people of Coast City, they knew exactly who was flying high above them.
"So, do we have any idea who these Manhunters are hunting or are we going to have to search the whole world blind?" Cyra asked, watching them streak under the stars.
"The Guardians said they are coming to Coast City, looking for a fugitive, but their definition of fugitive greatly differs from ours."
Cyra snorted. "They decided to come to Coast City AKA Green Lantern central. Bad move."
"Let's show them that then," Hal laughed.
They flew up high above Coast City, so the people disappeared. Even the cars were only blips on a much larger map. The lights of ice cream shops and lifeguard stands twinkled and to the left, a large expanse of dark waters clapped together. Their height didn't matter as Cyra could still taste the salty air as she opened her mouth to breath it all in. But then the oxygen was very thin, so she stopped before she passed out.
Hal aimed his ring at the city beneath them, a green light coming out of it like a barcode scanner as the older Green Lantern moved the laser among the city. The ring beeped along as Hal seemed almost bored by the actions before the ring did a quick succession of beeps as Hal reached the east end of the city.
"Hey, that's where Coast City High is," Cyra said before frowning at her realization. "Wait—so the mean alien guys are at my school?"
Hal shut off his ring. "Seems that way. Have any intergalactic fugitives running around? Probably has two heads or blue skin?"
"Not that I can think of." The two Green Lanterns began to fly towards the school, the city blurring underneath them. "But I hope it's my art teacher. That guy's a jerk."
Hal snorted at the commentary as they flew, quickly landing in front of the school. Since schools didn't have a concept of time, the lights were still on, illuminating the dark streets. Waves of midnight gas stations and deserted streets that didn't seem to have a concept of time wracked Cyra as she looked at the school. She made a face of disgust.
"Ugh, this place gives off bad vibes. Can we go now?"
"Come on," Hal sighed as he walked up to the school and tried the door, but it wouldn't budge. He snapped his fingers before getting into a fighting stance. Next, the drama queen did a little punch, a green glove appearing to break the doorknob in pieces. The door swung open easily.
"What?" Hal asked Cyra, who was shaking her head.
Cyra just rolled her eyes and walked into the school first. It was surprisingly chilly in the school, but Cyra just assumed the cheap place didn't pay for heating this year. They lived on the coast anyways—it was hot all the time! (Cyra wrote a school paper about getting rid of the heaters in favor of cookies at lunch. Maybe the school finally agreed?).
The school was illuminated, making Cyra blink repeatedly to try and get her eyes used to the new bright lights. "Now, if you were an evil robot cop looking for a fugitive in a high school, where would you look first?" Cyra asked.
Hal didn't need to answer as immediately after Cyra spoke those words, a mass of muscle jumped out from the empty office door, checking the young Green Lantern into a wall.
"Oof!" Cyra grunted as she hit the bricks before sliding to the ground, groaning.
The Green Lantern instantly got into a fighting stance as he scanned the Manhunter. He was at least six foot five, build on muscles. His skin was a sickly gray and he was wearing an orangish red suit with purple gloves and a weird helmet on its head that made it look like a bowl. Not to mention the creepy glowing yellow eyes.
The Manhunter made an odd long beeping sound. "Scan complete." Its voice was regal and emotionless. Like the robot it was. "Hal Jordan, member of the Green Lantern Corps. Please leave now and you will not sustain the amount of damage as the girl."
Cyra rolled over on the floor, her hand clasped over her shoulder.
Hal's lip curled as a large green fist appeared over his own. "Hell no!" He yelled as he swung at the Manhunter. The Manhunter dodged him before raising his arm, a light beginning to grow from the top. Hal only had time for his eyes to go wide beneath his mask before being hit with a large laser, knocking right through the front doors of the school and into the parking lot.
Hal rolled over his back before scrambling to his feet. The Manhunter walked out of the building with a slow gaunt. "You are not who we are looking for. Surrender now or be destroyed."
Cyra shuffled out from the building behind the Manhunter. She was nursing her shoulder with a tired look on her face.
Hal reached out with his hand, a green layer wrapping up one of the buses that sat, waiting to pick kids up. Instead, Hal did the picking up and launched the bus at the Manhunter as his answer. "This is what you get for hitting my protegee, you iPhone!"
The bus hit the Manhunter, causing it to fly out of view as the bus rolled after its flailing body. Cyra blinked, not sure if she heard right. "iPhone?" She muttered. Her head was still throbbing from where it hit the wall.
"Are you alright?" Hal asked, rushing over to her as he put his hands on her shoulder. Cyra winced. "I think your shoulder is dislocated."
Cyra gave him a blank expression before making two other arms over her shoulder. They closed in, twisting her shoulder back into place with a loud pop. Cyra let out a pained scream.
"What the hell?" Hal asked. "Didn't that hurt?"
"I'm so dead inside I feel no pain." Cyra rolled her eyes before narrowing them sharply in the direction of where the Manhunter had fallen. "Uh, he's gone."
Hal's head snapped in the direction of the bus. He picked up the bus again with a large green hand and threw it to the side. The spot where he was the Manhunter's limp body was empty. Hal smiled sheepishly at Cyra. "Oops."
"What did you say about Manhunters never stopping until you find your target again?" Cyra grimaced.
Both of the Green Lanterns sprinted in the direction of the school. They just reached one of the side doors that would have led them into the guy when the whole school shook. Windows were blown open and they were flung off their feet, getting their breath knocked out of them.
"Oh no," Hal breathed.
Cyra looked up to see the school in flames, arcing high above the cloud. "At least I don't have to go to school on Monday."
"Where is it?" A loud booming electronic voice roared through the debris. Cyra and Hal quickly scrambled their feet in time for an angry Manhunter to charge out of the west end of the broken-down school. He stalked up to Hal and grabbed him by his throat, lifting him off the ground. "What have you done with them? Where have you hidden them? You will never survive a questioning of a Manhunter," the alien growled darkly in Hal's face, who was beginning to turn red from lack of breathing.
Two green constructs grew and shaped over Cyra's arms as she ended up aiming two large machine guns at the Manhunter. She doubted she could even dent the thing, but it was the best she could do. Hal wasn't reacting either. He could have easily got the Manhunter off with his own ring, but he was trusting Cyra—putting his life in her hands. "What are you talking about? We didn't hide anything! We're too busy trying to stop you, remember? Or does your heart drive not remember past five minutes?"
"The last signatures were in this location. They must have been here." The Manhunter turned its glowing yellow eyes on Cyra. "Where are they?"
"I swear, we don't know. We don't even know who you were after. We just followed you," Cyra said. Hal was making gasping sounds, his face turning bluish. "Now let him down before I turn you into swiss cheese, Robocop."
The Manhunter seemed to examine Hal for a quick moment before dropping him to his feet, where he almost fell, clutching his throat. There were dark bruises on it that made Cyra's blood boil. Hal took in deep, shaky breaths.
The Manhunter turned completely to the blonde. "Your vitals are even. You are not lying to me. That means there is still work to be done." The Manhunter turned and was about to take off when green ropes suddenly wrapped around his limbs. They didn't exactly hold him back and Cyra didn't doubt he could force his way through her constructs, but for now, it kept him in place for whatever reason.
"You think we're just going to let you go so you can go kill some person?" Cyra chuckled darkly. "Not going to happen. Time to stop the bad guy."
Cyra leaped forward, dropping the ropes, but still keeping them tightly restricted around the guy. She moved her body up so her feet would hit his chest. For extra umpth, A mental box of sorts wrapped around Cyra's legs, making her a human battering ram.
Cyra briefly heard her name being called from Hal but was kind of busy with being backhanded by the Manhunter, flying several feet away, where she then rolled for a few moments before groaning. Maybe that wasn't the best idea to take on a super robot Manhunter—one of the largest threats in the galaxy? Just maybe?
Hal ran over to her and crouched beside her to make sure she was okay. Cyra nodded with a groan as she sat up. "This day has been too long," Cyra complained as she shuffled back up to her feet, Hal putting a gentle hand on her back.
"Mood."
"Did you just say 'mood'?" Cyra asked.
"Isn't that how the cool kids talk?"
Cyra smirked. "That makes me a cool kid."
The Manhunter leveled his glowing super laser gun at the pair of Green Lanterns. "This is your last warning, stay away or die. No man escapes the Manhunters."
Out of the corner of their eyes, Hal and Cyra looked at each other. Hal slowly tilted up an eyebrow as Cyra's lip tugged upwards. They looked back to the Manhunter with matching expressions of amusement. Cyra cracked her knuckles.
A comically large green baseball bat appeared in Cyra's hand. She swung it mockingly as she took a step forward. Hal held his hand up with his fist clenched, a boxing glove covering it before growing a hundred times the size of his fist.
"You have no hope of stopping me," the Manhunter said with the same fiery sense of confidence in his monotonous voice.
"We don't need hope," Hal said. "We have willpower."
And then they fought.
For Cyra, it was mostly a blur, but she couldn't tell if they were winning or not. The Manhunter fought back, throwing them around like rag dolls with its super strength and flying up to smash down on their shields with all its might. Besides that, Cyra had a growing feeling of victory in her chest.
Hal and herself worked as a well-oiled machine. Hal would crouch when Cyra jumped or Cyra duck when Hal fired some monstrosity of a construct on the Manhunter. The baseball bat after a few hits was replaced by a machine gun only to be taken up by a falling piano before a large wrecking ball that made the Manhunter go splat into the side of the school bus. Hal's boxing gloves grew to the size of cars and punched down on the Manhunter before lifting a bus and throwing it at the Manhunter at one point in the fight. The Manhunter caught it and almost made Cyra a spot of blood on the sidewalk if she didn't fly up in time to miss it.
The Green Lantern's clashed a few times in the air. Hal had green lines running off his arms and onto the Manhunter, tying it around the robot like serpents before the Manhunter managed to break away. Cyra could feel her energy ebbing away. Her ring didn't seem to be glowing as lightly as before.
Green Lanterns got their power from their ring, which they got from the Guardians and their all-powerful forces. Her ring was charged and needed some cooldown time before doing much. Earlier in her career, the Guardians had her ring on training wheels of sorts. She couldn't do any of the huge stuff like making airplanes or bazookas. Since Cyra got her training wheels off, her ring barely got tired. Cyra believed this to be the first time unless you counted the whole holding up a fallen building thing right before she got her training wheels off.
Cyra came to a realization. This was the first her ring was really on low-battery. She was only going for a long time, not doing anything particularly huge. Who knows what Cyra could unlock in her ring with this new power.
The blonde took a step back from the fighting, holding her palms to the ground with her eyes closed. To some, she could have been mistaken for meditating—or being high. That was not the case. What Cyra was doing was an ancient art than many people in modern times have forgotten.
Thinking.
Hal was being overpowered. He and the Manhunter were floating a few feet from the ground, their arms locked in a pushing completion of sorts as if they were playing Chicken without the people on the bottom.
Cyra's amber eyes snapped open—a new power stirring within her. "Move, Hal!" She yelled his real name. Hal immediately got the hint and pushed the Manhunter away, trusting his protégée to finish this fight.
The Manhunter turned to her with the closest look of doubt on his face as an emotionless robot could get. Cyra let a cocky smirk touch her face.
Something started to grow slowly out of the ground. It was huge and shaped like a 3D V, bright green as every other construct. Cyra's ring buzzed and glowed on her finger—a warning, but Cyra knew (hoped) she had enough time. It moved slowly than Cyra wanted, but the Manhunter looked too distracted by it as he scanned it oddly to fly out of its reach. Good.
A bead of sweat ran down Cyra's face, but in a last burst of energy, she pushed her arms up with a battle cry.
Maybe it had to do with the nice ocean breeze that Cyra felt earlier or the fact that Cyra passed over a smelly fish place on the way here, but a gigantic green Megalodon-style shark burst out of the ground.
It was at least the size of a bus, a glowing green with shiny skin. Fins stuck out from beneath and the tail was the height of Hal alone, flicking back and forth as it shot out of the ground as if it could fly. It had gills at the side and you could even see its muscle in its strong body. Dark green emotionless eyes were on the top—not truly seeing, but the Manhunter probably wasn't staring into the shark's eyes when it huge mouth opened to reveal hundreds of rows of teeth, all turning around like a saw on the inside.
The shark swallowed the Manhunter whole.
Cyra collapsed to her knees. The shark disappeared as if the greatest construct Cyra even made was never there at all, leaving just a ball of chewed and crushed up metal on the ground. You could easily see the dents and teeth marks in the garbage. Her ring throbbing painfully on her finger as black spots danced across her vision.
"That was . . . amazing!" Hal cheered, pumping his face in the air as he was in total complete fanboy mode. "I can't believe you did that! I'm totally going to brag about to John about this—oh wait, you're on the ground."
Hal ran over to Cyra and kneeled down next to her, putting his hands on her shoulders and shaking her once. "Cyra? Cyra, can you hear me?"
The blonde looked up, wobbling slightly as her amber eyes were pale and out of focus. Her head seemed to be crushing down on her brain before releasing over and over again. The world went out of focus.
A smile split Cyra's face. "Stopping the bad guys," she said slyly.
Hal let out a booming laugh that made Cyra's ears rattle, but she didn't stop smiling.
"Yep, with a shark," Hal added, a grin of his own.
"We still did never find that alien they were looking for."
"Nah, but they'll be okay."
"They'll just send more Manhunters."
"I doubt it," Hal snorted. "They now know that us Green Lantern's are made of." Hal held out his fist.
Cyra pumped it with her own, almost missing. "Cosmic energy and Shark Week."
"Exactly!" Hal pulled Cyra into a hug. "Now, let's go get some meatballs."
Around the corner of the burned school, a shape walked out of the wreckage. Their clothes were singed with black holes, still holding embers as the alien fugitive wiped away the dirt uselessly.
He shook himself to get his aching muscles better, but besides that he was virtually untouched, just seeming like he lost a fight with a campfire. His usually golden hair was burnt off, leaving his head bald and his eyebrows gone. He quickly moved his hands over it, the damage being replaced by new, clean locks.
"Stupid Manhunters," he muttered in an odd language. The alien walked around the edge of the school building, peeking around the corner to watch as the Manhunter was destroyed by a shark. He smirked evilly as he watched, seeing how the Green Lantern fell to her knees. He gaze her one last look before turning away.
His watch lit up as he pressed a button on the side. A scratchy and static-filled voice answered on the other end, "What is it?"
"You were right," the alien spoke, his voice sounding light and boyish. "The Green Lanterns took care of the Manhunter for me."
"Good," the voice chuckled darkly. If Cyra were to hear it, she would say it sounded like Smoak from Star Wars once he smoked too many cigarettes. Bad Smoak, those give you lung cancer, Cyra would say. The alien could feel himself almost smile as the humans would do. Almost. "What about the girl?"
"She's grown more powerful. She made a whole shark appear out of the ground and it looked real."
"The girl is creative and strong, I know. She is a threat to us, but you have her under control, correct?" It wasn't a question. It was an expectation.
The alien straightened it's back, even though the voice on the other end couldn't see him. "Of course, sir. I have Cyra Brion exactly where I want you."
"Very good," the voice repeated. The alien felt a shiver roll up his spin. He could imagine the savage smile that was on the other creature's face. "Keep up the work. I don't have to remind you what will happen if something was to go wrong."
The fugitive opened his mouth, but the watch beeped and the light went off. He shut his mouth and let out a sigh.
"Until next time," the alien fugitive, known on Earth as 'Charlie', said as he walked away from the flaming school and Green Lanterns.