9th February
Who even cares?
"Hey, Orange."
I continue staring moodily at the clouds of Karna as they sail beneath me.
Guy sits down next to me on the lump of defence satellite hull I dragged here from the Wombworld. I suppose that we may as well call it something else, now. I'll vote for 'Sheol' if anyone bothers talking to me about it.
"Kind of a shitty way t' end tha day, huh?"
"It's only midday. If I can stop the karnans and gordanians killing each other I'll…"
I'll what?
"I won't feel completely terrible about it."
"'least it wasn't tha Queen causin' trouble."
"You ever.. have a planet killed on your watch?"
"Well…" He shrugs. "When you're on tha Honor Guard, every planet's parta yer watch."
I turn my head and glare at him for a moment.
"Had a crazy AI turn a planet inta paperclips one time. I mean, we evacuated it before it killed everyone, but I still got a ringside seat at a whole world getting' 'maximised'."
"To be clear, I don't care about the psions dying at all. They were every bit as bad as the citadelians."
"Yeah? What about their kids?"
"Psions are vat-grown from tailored genes. Then they get raised by other psions. As a technique it's not-. It wasn't quite as reliable as what the citadelians did, but it was pretty close. That isn't like the gordanians, where they're just 'martial' and 'aggressive'. There aren't any non-mad scientist psions any more than there were non-warrior citadelians."
I turn fully to face him, crossing my legs as I do so.
"The Guardians changed their minds that quickly?"
He nods. "Logic, right. No point holdin' up yer end of tha treaty when tha other guys 're all dead."
"Did the 'New Vega Alliance' okay it?"
"They didn't complain too loud."
"Is someone going to kick Gretti into doing his job, or is Green Man handling it himself?"
"Wouldn't mind kickin' Gretti, but with tha Vega Alliance workin' on the pirate problem… Or, y'know, not causin' it so much, I'm not sure he needs help."
"I could have helped them do this better."
"Yeah."
"Dox would have loved training our Lanterns against the psion defences."
"Kinda cold."
"The psion civilisation was evil, but it was a relatively small and contained evil. I'd rather we discover the problems with our training here than against the Reach." I exhale. "If they'd actually talked to me, I'd have been delighted that they'd-."
I feel an impulse from down below.
"Excuse me."
I send a tether down, then yank, a surprised karnan woman with a simple laser weapon appearing in front of me.
"Put the gun down."
"Wh-? What?"
"The gun you were about to fire. Put it-."
She focuses on me. "You're protecting them? After what they did to my family, to my-."
"I'm protecting the ceasefire that is preventing millions more people dying. Once Karna is at peace, you are free to pursue your personal vendettas without my intervention, but until then I will not let you make the situation worse. Now put down the gun."
She hesitates, then releases it and I let it float away into the void.
"Thank you."
A flash of orange and she reappears at ground level.
"Ah, that they'd sorted things out without me."
"That was new."
"Only good thing about this trip. I knew Blake was intelligent, but-."
"No, I meant grabbin' people off the ground like that. How'd you pick up on that, anyway?"
"I can search large groups for particular desires. You should be able to do something similar."
"Heh. Nice." He idly looks down at the planet before returning his attention to me. "So what you got goin' on next?"
"I'm making sure this bit goes alright, then I'm… Going back to Earth. I'm going to try putting Doctor Roquette in touch with Leonard Snart, she was having problems setting up cold fields for her nanofabricator… Unless you think there's something else I'm missing?"
"Nah. 'less you think there is?"
"They're working together more or less rationally. I could stick my oar in, but I'm not feeling any pressing need to." I shake my head. "Would you mind looking after this for a few minutes? I need to go and talk to Koriand'r."
Guy nods. "Think I can handle that. Keep tha kitties from shootin' the crocs, right?"
"Close enough."
I step out
and reappear on Changraylyn, a handful of grey-skinned melted-waxwork-looking locals looking around before they go back to ignoring me.
"Lantern Koriand'r, do you have a moment?"
The priest she was talking to bows and then walks away, leaving Koriand'r and I alone.
"You are unhappy."
"Yes, yes I am."
She nods solemnly, walking closer and… Hugging me? I instinctively hug back, but I'm.. not sure why she's doing th-.
"I used my ring to find as many of the psions' prisoners as I could, even as the fleet began firing upon the planet. It showed me them dying whenever their cells were hit." She sniffs. "I was not skilled enough to save even a fraction-."
"And that's why I'm annoyed. Koriand'r, why didn't you call for aid?"
"You gave us these rings and charged us with protecting this region. I did not want to let you down further by calling for help."
"Koriand'r, I don't care about that. And neither should you. What matters is creating a decent civilisation, providing succour to the good and making sure that the bad can't hurt the good. The whole reason why we have a Corps is so that the parts which are faced with more opposition, the parts which are having a hard time, can get help from the rest. You feel bad calling for help? Lantern Ragnar would feel that he was being lazy because he missed out on the fight. This job doesn't just require that we put our bodies on the line, but sometimes our pride as well because the outcome for the people in our care is what matters most."
I pull back slightly, looking her full in the face.
"Do you understand?"
She nods. "Yes."
"Okay. Now then, since the 'New Vega Alliance' has things planned out so well, where can I make myself useful?"
