The Emerald Torch

by Onomonopia

Where There's A Will...

John hurled a shield construct in front of him the moment Brainiac lunged forward with a hand outstretched, yet cracks spread across his defense the moment Brainiac's fist slammed into his barrier. The force of the impact skidded John backwards, where he fell to one knee with shock spreading through his mind.

"What's the matter, John? You seem...surprised by my new attitude," Brainiac said coldly while he extended a hand, firing yellow bolts of lightning towards the Green Lantern. John reinforced his barrier before deflecting the blast, but even with the shield deflecting the majority of the blasts, John still felt the electricity course through his limbs. "Emotions...are such a foreign concept to me, but I believe that I am starting to comprehend them more."

"And yet, you're just as egotistical as always!" John snarled before slamming his shield into the ruined ground before constructing a sniper rifle and taking aim at the machine, firing high velocity, armor piercing shots into and through Brainiac's chest. To John's surprise, the shots actually went through Brainiac's armor, yet they also caused more chunks of his armor to fall out and more light shone from within.

"Come now John, you know that fighting me is pointless. This isn't even my body anymore," Brainiac stated with a smile that was as broken as his body, the smile slowly growing larger while he walked forward with a hand extended. "The moment I sensed that emotions had permeated my form, I moved my true conscious to another body and shut nearly all of my technology off from this one. Call this a "faulty form" of mine."

"You always were harder to kill than a damn cockroach!" John snarled as his will burned and a spear of an emerald hue materialized in his grasp, allowing him to spin quickly and thrust the weapon into one of the already cracked areas of Brainiac's armor. The impalement temporarily slowed down the machine. "So then, why bother keeping this "faulty form" around?!" John snarked.

"Call this...a learning experiment," Brainiac replied with another cracked smile before he took aim at John in front of him. Yet, bolts of green rained from the sky before he could destroy the Lantern, so with a face that shifted from smiling to rage-fueled, the machine took aim at the Lanterns floating around them and unleashed golden hellfire upon them. "To find out what the effects emotions have on machines such as myself."

"And what have you discovered so far, you psycho?!" John demanded while he constructed football armor around his body and flung himself shoulder first into the machine, knocking off his aim while tackling him to the crater. The stray shots from Brainiac's arms struck a number of buildings that were still standing, bringing them down around the two as John unleashed all of his will into Brainiac's skull.

Yet, the green light of will quickly found itself overpowered by a combined blast of red, yellow and orange that erupted from Brainiac's eyes, blasting John in the chest and skyrocketing him upwards. Despite the searing pain in his chest, he managed to catch himself in time and willed to remain floating above the battlefield as Brainiac got up.

"I have discovered...that emotions are problematic," Brainiac stated with a cold tone, a tone that John recognized as Brainiac's true voice. "That they impair thought and reason...and somehow allow you heroes to overpower and defeat me time after time after time." And for a moment, Brainiac seemed to regain control of himself, regain control of the superior intellect that he was. He looked around at the hundreds of Lanterns floating around him with narrowed eyes, making a decision in his mind.

"Whatever you're thinking, it ain't gonna happen!" John bellowed as he rained green missiles down upon Brainiac, while other Lanterns of varying colors floated beside him, adding their own lights in the bombardment of the destroyer of worlds. But when the lights died down and the dust settled, the Lanterns found to their horror that Brainiac not only still stood safe under a barrier, but he had also seemed to reach his decision.

"Yes...I see it clearly now," Brainiac stated to himself as he looked around at all of the Green Lanterns. "Will. That is the source of all my problems. You heroes, when defeated, when beaten, find the will to rise and oppose me time and time again. Will is the source of your powers. Conclusion, the only way to truly destroy you heroes," Brainiac began as his body began to glow with an unholy light. "Is to destroy will itself."

"And the hell we'll let you!" John roared while he led the charge with the nearby Lanterns against Brainiac, who turned his head upwards to glare at the hundreds of Lanterns all plummeting towards him. Yet in a move that confused the Lanterns, he plunged one of his own hands into his chest. He then ripped his own hand out of the hole to show a sphere that shone with a multitude of colors. Brainiac then pointed the sphere at the sky and began unleashing blasts of combined light that struck down any Lantern who fell under its light, forcing John to duck and weave as fast as he could to avoid the shots.

"RRRAAAGGGHHHH!" John brought his fist back and slammed it against Brainiac's own hand when he got close enough, generating a green shockwave that rippled for blocks across the ruined city. Brainiac retaliated by firing blasts of red out of his eyes and straight into John's chest, but the Green Lantern held strong while he slammed his other fist into Brainiac's skull to change the angle of his shots.

"You think that just by killing the Green Lanterns that you'll kill all of the will in the galaxy?! Hell no Brainiac, even if you manage to do away with us there will still be millions...no, BILLIONS of beings that will fight you!" John roared as he channeled all of his will into his right fist and swung at Brainiac for all he was worth. Brainiac followed the motion by driving his left fist into John's right, but when the fists collided, to Brainiac's shock, his own hand was crumpled under the sheer power of John's will.

"Interesting," Brainiac stated as he backed away and looked at his crumpled fist before turning his eyes on the glaring Lantern. "Yet, by choosing to face me alone, you have sealed your fate. You should have listened to your reason instead of your emotions."

"That's always been the problem with you, Brainiac. You've always viewed living beings as weak, that our emotions hinder us and that our morality will be our downfall," John said with power while he concentrated his will once again and drove his fist into Brainiac's chest, unleashing all of his green light into the plate while tearing chunks of metal off the machine. "But even now that you have the same emotions as us, you can't tap into the same power! Because you have no heart. Because you have no WILL!"

John unleashed more of his ring's power into Brainiac's shattered chest, but in the blink of an eye Brainiac appeared before John and slammed his fist into the Lantern's gut. John doubled over while Brainiac lifted an elbow over his back and drove the point home, driving John into the ruined streets as he hit with enough force to bounce back up, where Brainiac kicked him in the gut and laid him out.

'Dammit...think I...broke a few bones there,' John thought weakly while he fought to push himself up, glaring at Brainiac as the destroyer was attacked once again by even more Lanterns. Brainiac fired into the sky, but was completely overpowered by the sheer number of Lanterns that were shooting at him. "Get it now, Brainiac? You've lost. Even you can't defeat every Lantern on this planet. Your laser is gone and you're alone now. It's over."

"Indeed it is," Brainiac agreed before constructing a barrier around both himself and John, deflecting the Lanterns' fires as he turned his attention to the single Green Lantern. "This battle is pointless now. You cannot defeat me and I no longer wish to deal with you. So it is time I put an end to the source of the heroes' strength."

"The hell do you mean by that?" John was just about to beat Brainiac's meaning out of him, when his ring answered his question for him.

'Lantern Stewart, Brainiac's vessel...it is falling towards the planet.' With horror filling up his heart, John and the rest of the Green Lanterns looked up to see that, indeed, the massive skull on the face of the fortress was growing larger and larger as it slowly began to fall towards the planet.

"Damn it! All Lanterns to me, we need to stop that station!" John roared into his ring, but all of his attention was brought back to Brainiac when rays of strange light cast themselves over him. John turned to find that Brainiac was radiating a light, the likes of which he had never seen, made all the more unnerving when he saw the smile on Brainiac's face.

"Time for one last experiment. How strong is the will of a single Lantern?" Brainiac asked before his entire being shone with light, forcing John to create a shield around himself as the metal body of Brainiac exploded in a brilliant flash of rainbow light. His shield held as the light washed over him, but when he turned his head to watch the shockwave of light, he saw that every Lantern it struck let out a cry of pain before their rings failed them. With horror in his eyes, he watched as Lanterns fell from the skies, forcing him into action while he constructed a massive catcher's mitt that he used to catch as many of them as he could.

"What's the matter with them?" John asked when he had saved as many as possible and safely put them on the ground, watching with disbelief as they all tried in vain to get their rings to work.

'It seems...that this version of Brainiac used the last of the Lantern light that he had stolen, along with his knowledge of the rings to temporarily depower the rings of the Lantern Corps,' the ring explained to John. 'The only reason I still function is because of your will, which was enough to fend off Brainiac's wave of light.' Sickly horror clawed at John's heart as he slowly turned and looked up at the falling space station, which was getting closer and closer by the second.

"You bastard..." John whispered in horror as realization dawned on him, finally realizing what Brainiac was planning to do. "He's not just trying to destroy the Corps, he's trying to destroy the entire planet! And with all of the Lanterns out of commission, there's no way to stop his fortress! What would happen if that fortress strikes the planet?!"

'While it does seem to be smaller than most moons, no more than one hundred miles in diameter, with all of the technology and weaponry based inside of it, there is no knowing what kind of destruction it will cause if it strikes the planet,' the ring explained before making a guess. 'And since Brainiac has planned this, I have no doubt that the space station is programmed to destroy the whole planet when it explodes.'

"And...how long will the other Lanterns' rings be down?" John asked weakly while he looked around at all of the rescued Lanterns, none of them, be they Blue, Yellow or Green, able to tap into their power.

'I do not know the specifics, but if I were to wager a guess...long enough.' For a long moment John didn't know what to do. Despite being the only Lantern that was still operational, he knew that he didn't have the kind of power to destroy something so large, much less stop it from crashing into the planet.

'There's...nothing I can do,' John thought silently, vaguely remembering how Brainiac had told him that the last emotion he would ever feel was hopelessness. 'And he knew it. This was all planned from the beginning. He planned to cripple the Lanterns, to make sure that they didn't have a chance! Damn it all!' he roared with fury, a fury of helplessness as he clenched his fists.

Then John looked around him, looked around at all of the other Lanterns who were gazing up at the falling station with the same hopelessness and defeat in their eyes. Then, his gaze slowly fell upon the crater, the crater where Spike and Sweetie, along with the other freed Lanterns still lay. In a flash of green, he flew over to the pair of them and scanned them with his ring to find that they were both still alive, albeit unconscious.

'I'm sorry, you two. After everything the pair of you went through, all the obstacles you both overcame...we couldn't do it. Brainiac won,' John gritted with rage. Yet, as he looked down at the two Lanterns that he had spent nearly a month training, exploring and laughing with, his ring spoke to him once more.

'Lantern Stewart. Do you know why I picked you out of all the other people on Earth? Above Superman? Above Batman?' his ring asked him, getting John to look away from the kids and towards his ring. 'It is because I saw a will in you that I did not see in anyone else. I saw a will that wasn't devoid of fear, that wasn't the most noble, or perhaps not even the strongest. But the will I saw was a will that, if the time came, would move the very heavens themselves to save the world.'

John took the hint and looked up at the falling fortress, knowing what the ring was asking of him. "And you really believe...that I have the will to move that? That alone, I can stop something that massive?"

'Lantern Stewart, I thought you knew better than that. When you are a member of the Green Lanterns, you are never alone.' The words struck John harder than he ever believed possible and as he looked around once again, he knew that his ring was right.

'They all are depending on me. I'm the only one who can do something,' John thought before looking down once again at Spike and Sweetie, who were both sleeping peacefully next to each other despite the impending doom. 'And I made a promise to the both of you, that I would teach you what it meant to be a Lantern, and if necessary die to protect you. But I couldn't protect you, Spike, from Brainiac and I couldn't protect Sweetie from the pain of losing a loved one...but this,' John thought with a fire welling up in him that caused his whole body to begin glowing. 'This is something I can protect you from.'

"Thanks, the both of you. I had to admit that I was hesitant to have the both of you come with me on this mission at first," John admitted before smiling down at the pair as he stood up, ignoring the pain. "But the two of you have given me hope for the future. But now, it's my turn...to make sure the both of you have one."

Then, with a burst of emerald light John Stewart shot into the sky, the lone light that flew towards the falling space station. Despite the enormity of the task and the size of the object hurtling towards him, he allowed no doubt or fear to enter his mind. He came to a stop in front of the space station, taking in the seemingly impossible task of what he was about to try to do.

So, with a roar of fury John unleashed his strongest blast of green light into the falling fortress, yet the ray of green crumbled under the weight and girth of the falling chunk of metal. Undeterred, John fired another beam of concentrated will into the space station, yet the result was hardly any different than before.

"Dammit all! I have the will, so why doesn't it work?!" John bellowed as he concentrated all of his power into a massive blast that he fired into the center of the skull, trying to slow the space station down to no avail. "You said I could do this!"

'I did. I also did not say you should attack it head on. Also...I cannot exert the force necessary to stop it from here...without putting your life at risk,' the ring explained, causing the rage to leave John's face and instead be replaced with understanding. 'If I were to exert the full capabilities of this ring, the strain it would place on your body would be far to great. There must be another-'

"Do it," John cut the ring off. "Unleash the full power."

'Lantern Stewart, if I were to do that with the shape you are in...you would not survive,' the ring warned him. John thought about his answer for a moment, knowing that there were people on Earth who needed him, who depended on him and wanted him to come home. But then, he remembered that others needed him now, how the entire universe depended on the Green Lanterns to remain safe. And as a Lantern, he couldn't let them down.

"Do it."

Green light surrounded John as he felt the full power of his will finally brought to light. With the newfound power flowing through him, he gazed up at the falling station and pointed his ring towards the center of the machine.

"LIGHT IT UP!" he roared before an emerald typhoon of power erupted from his ring, hurtling itself towards the space station and striking it dead in the center of its forehead. And with all of his will being unleashed against the falling space station, for a brief moment the fortress seemed to slow down. But in the next moment a sickening snapping sound could be heard in his arm and with a cry of pain he canceled the attack as his arm dangled at a strange angle.

'I warned you, Lantern Stewart. If we try dismantling it from the inside-'

"No time!" John grunted in pain as he constructed an exoskeleton around his body that set his arm straight, gritting his teeth while suppressing the pain. He switched his ring to his other hand and fired at the moon again, once again able to stop it for a brief moment before the sheer weight of the moon shattered his construct. "Damn it! If I don't use full power the construct isn't strong enough, and if I used full power my body can't take it...so I guess there's no choice."

'What are you planning?' his ring asked before John hurled himself skyward towards the falling fortress, reinforcing the exoskeleton with all of the will he held within.

"If my beams can't stop it and my body can't take it, then there's only one thing left to try," John stated right before he slammed into the side of the massive, metallic structure, slamming his shoulders into it while he created green rockets to fire with all of his will. "I'm taking a page out of Clark's book!"

Then, John began to strain with all of his will and might, pushing against the moon with such force that his exoskeleton began to crack under the strain and weight. But despite pouring his everything into stopping the plummeting meteor, it was a futile battle as the emerald city below grew larger and larger. John roared with all of his might while he continued to plummet with the metal fortress, barely slowing it down even as the crushing weight of the fortress began to crack the bones in his body.

'Got to...keep...pushing...can't...let them down!' John roared within his mind, but his thoughts barely added any more power to his efforts and the fortress continued its disastrous descent down into the city below. The tops of the tallest skyscrapers were crushed underneath the massive fortress as they were the first to be impacted by the metal station, which began to push them flat as John continued to struggle.

'It's...not enough. Even my...full power...couldn't...' John weakly thought as everything started to go black. But then, out of the corner of his eyes despite him barely being able to see, John spotted something he didn't expect to see. Tiny bolts of green were bouncing off of the metal around him, green bolts that could have only come from the planet below. And despite them doing nothing, the green bolts kept coming.

'It is the other Lanterns. Those whose rings are just beginning to work are trying to help you,' the ring explained for John.

'They haven't given up.' That single thought pierced through the pain and agony that the Green Lantern was going through. None of the Lanterns had given up. None of them would accept defeat. Instead, they were choosing to fight. 'That's right...Lanterns never give up on each other! No matter how hopeless the situation seems! That's why we wear the ring! Because we choose to face fear and defeat and overcome!' And in that moment, despite the pain, agony and soul crushing weight of the task at hand, John found his true strength.

And he knew exactly what to say:

"In brightest day...in blackest night...no evil...shall...escape my sight," he began, blood beginning to trickle from his mouth as his green aura shone brighter than it ever had before. The fortress had crushed the taller of the buildings and was hurtling down towards the center of the Oa, where all of the Lanterns were gathered. John looked down and realized that he had seconds before impact, seconds before the fortress crushed him and every other Lantern there, before possibly destroying the planet. But that only made him stronger.

"For all those...who fight with me still...if you lend me your strength, then I might...no...not might!" John roared as he felt his feet be driven into the ground, shattering the emerald road beneath him as the fortress decimated the buildings around him and all of the other Lanterns. But even as buildings collapsed and the planet was shaken to its very core, the fortress moved no further. For underneath the fortress stood a single man, a man who glowed with the light of the Green Lanterns.

"I WILL!"

With that one proclamation, the light surrounding John shone as bright as a star and his body took on the full weight of the station. The green exoskeleton that John had placed around himself shattered under the strain of lifting an object of such gigantic proportions, shattering every bone in the Lantern's body under the weight of the space station. Yet, despite the weight and despite the pain that seared across every nerve in his body, the light of the Green Lantern remained strong. Blood poured from his eyes and mouth and his body shook horribly under the soul shattering weight, but the station fell no further despite its desire to do so. And for a moment, the other Green Lanterns watched on in awe as the single Lantern stood strong. For a moment, billions of tons rested upon a single being. For a moment, no one knew how it was possible.

For in that moment, John was strong enough to lift the world.

Then, all at once, hundreds of beams of yellow light began to attach themselves to the fallen space station and all eyes looked to the sky to see hundreds of Sinestro Corps members descending from above, using their light to lift the burden from the single Lantern's shoulders. Sinestro and the rest of his Corps then began to fly the station back into orbit, smirking down at the Green, Yellow and Blue Lanterns who cheered for him all the while.

But for a single Lantern, he never heard the cheering of the crowd. Nor did he know that the weight had been lifted from his shoulders or that his world was safe. The white eyes of John Stewart saw none of the lights that helped to lift the fortress, nor could he hear the triumph and cheering. And as his body finally gave out, finally surrendered to the strain and devastation, it fell forward and collapsed to the ground with barely a sound. The green light died around him as the light returned to the ring on his left hand, but a moment later the ring removed itself from his finger and took to the air, seeking out its next member. It did not have to go far.

"Spike of Equestria," the ring stated as it floated down onto the unconscious dragon, landing in the opened palm of his hand. "You have the ability to overcome greater fear."

"Welcome to the Green Lantern Corps."

Comments

[VampDash]

BOOYAH!

[Uzume Tennouboshi]

Damn. RIP, John Stewart.

[Darth Arcaneus]

OH MY GOD! THEY KILLED JOHN STEWART!!!

[FleetlordAvatar]

He was always a strong willed one.

[badninja]

6424146

Those bastards!

All in all it was kinda telegraphed all over the place so the impact was not really there.

[Dubya]

The green light died around him as the light returned to the ring on his left hand, but a moment later the ring removed itself from his finger and took to the air, seeking out its next member.

static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Colbert_3741.jpg

[VunderGuy]

Wow. A hundred miles is160.934 kilometers. For the record, the First Death Star was 120 kilometers in diameter and the second one is often calculated to be 160 kilometers in diameter.

Still, though, I don't understand why Brainiac decided to scuttle a ship like that. I mean, in order to move it quickly, the sub-light engine output ALONE could probably fry everything around the central battery, so why Brainiac didn't aim all of the station's dedicated weapons platforms at the central battery to destroy it, which is all he really needs to do, confounds me, since that would be the easiest and brightest tactical move he could make. Perhaps the emotions of the other corps got to him in ways he hasn't realized yet, which is why he decided to crash War World into Oa, thusly causing its power core to overload and release most or all of its energy like a giant, drone delivered kamikaze bomb.

[VunderGuy]

I think this track from The Last Starfighter fits John's talking to Sweetie and Spike's unconscious selves and then everything else up to his death:

[Marvelsoldier]

Dang. Where's Kyle Rayner when you need him? You know the guy who actually HAS moved a moon. static.comicvine.com/uploads/scale_super/9/96657/1785207-kylemoon3.jpg

[Autistic Retard]

"If my beams can't stop it and my body can't take it, then there's only one thing left to try," John stated right before he slammed into the side of the massive, metallic structure, slamming his shoulders into it while he created green rockets to fire with all of his will. "I'm taking a page out of Clark's book!"

Best quote, hands down