The very big lantern that used to be in Lord Malvolio's space station is now sitting in a cargo bay in his flagship, glowing vibrant green.
"The Guardians of Oa keep their secrets well; e'en after their servants have fought across the galaxy for millennia, little knowledge of their true methods has reached the ears of the hoi polloi. Know you why they used lanterns as their sigil?"
To be fair, the Green Lantern insignia
is a fairly simple iconographic design: A ring with bars above and below (and is the shape the Green Light flows through
naturally...) Easy to customise for personal uniforms... Just look at Kyle Rayner's evolving
outfits. Just don't mention his
dog-collar period...
"A lantern on a stick used to be the tool and sign of office of their law enforcement. Much as law enforcement agencies on Earth have a seal despite us not sealing official documents with wax any longer, so they decided to keep the general shape with the charging devices that their agents use."
"A curious act; I had not thought them capable of such sentimentality."
And I find myself picturing it looking like the 'Tangent'
Green Lantern. Though I suspect a few more martially-inclined Lanterns converted into something more like a large
mace... They could
literally '
lamp' someone.
"How easy would it be for Christianity to change its primary emblem from the cross to anything else?" I shrug as I try to work out how large a problem this is likely to be. "And Christianity has barely been around for two thousand years. The Green Corps has used Lanterns for millions."
"They do it then not for their own benefit but for the benefit of those they claim to protect."
Image is
everything, even when it comes to protecting the galaxy. Though knowing the Guardians, it's likely just...
"It might be sentimentality. Or it could be that the current design works and so they don't see any purpose in changing it."
"By what I know of their staid natures, the latter is more likely."
...Ideological inertia. They don't plan to change it because it's not worth the effort of redoing 7200+ agents' equipment... Never
mind the redecorating they'd need to employ on Oa.
"I don't know. Appa Ali Apsa seemed like he had a little more life in him."
"You know their names?"
Well,
some. It's not like
every Guardian who appeared in the comics was always
named. Though I don't see OL sharing the
exact nature of his extra-universal origins with Malvolio anytime soon.
"I've met them all briefly. Their names aren't secret, they just don't value them, or value individuality. And they've all known each other for so long that they don't need to use them in conversation with each other. Controller Hinon thinks it's a stupid affectation, so it might be just the younger ones who are weird about names."
I take a closer look at the giant lantern, giving it a scan for good measure.
In other words, the namelessness thing is a teenage
fad.
I
like that idea, it's so monumentally
silly.
"What is it for? I assumed that you got a personal lantern from… Ah…"
"Mine natural father."
Ah. I take it he didn't know his biological father growing up. That would have made his life a
lot harder back then.
"I… Hadn't realised that he was your father."
"I came home to find mine mother being assailed by what I perceived to be a demon. T'was only after I ran him through that I learned truth."
...Now, when you say 'assailing', is it like accidentally walking on on your parents...
"Ah, 'assailed'?"
"In congress."
...
Right! That'd be
quite the shock. Especially if his father wasn't one of those
many extremely human-like species.
Ah.
I mean, it's never been a problem for me, but I imagine that maintaining the focus required for an environmental shield while engaged in sexual relations isn't that easy for a Green Lantern.
I mean,
you have
Enlightenment on your side. I would not be surprised to find Guy
can manage it too, but I would hope he'd leave the ring
off for fun times with Tora.
"I know that killing a Green Lantern doesn't disqualify a person from getting the ring after them, but I'm a little surprised that you were able to keep it."
"I thought it a talisman of his vile magics, that I risked all the fiends of Hell descending upon Manchester should my will fail e'en for a moment."
...And yet you still put it on and
kept it on... You were a
self-centred kid, weren't you?
"They didn't… Try communicating?"
"I thought them the fiend's diabolic masters, and told them such. The ring fought me, but I fought for all the souls of the men of Christendom."
Or to put it another way: The Ring requested he report to OA for basic training, he told it to sod off...
"And then?"
"It fell silent, and resisted me not. Later, Priest visited mine abode and explains affairs at a greater length."
...And the Guardians killed the onboard software. Because why
bother just ordering the ring to return?
"The AI." I nod. "They fried the AI, like they did for Yalan Gur."
"You refer to the ring's vocal spirit?"
Eh, Ring AI isn't really
smart enough to be self-aware in general. It's more like a good VI, with most apparently independent functions merely being
effective subroutines.
"I don't think it's a spirit, though I…"
I mean, the AI can't be build into the physical structure of the ring, it has to be a stable light structure… Doesn't it? That… Would make it sort of a spirit. I wonder if binding spells would work to shut down a ring's AI? Have to test that at some point.
Preferably not with your own gear, I would hope. Nor outside of a safe lab. I wonder, would Construct-Lantern Rings be different to Controller-made Rings in that sense...
"Yes. Which means that you wouldn't have had access to its database."
"Indeed I did not. Priest's teaching showed me how to harness the light of will well enough, but the Guardians barred me from their order."
I guess Priest decided on his own to train the rookie ring-wielder. I doubt the Guardians would have ordered it, nor been happy about it afterwards...
"So what's this for?"
"If I cannot join their Corps, I will simply make mine own. My imprisonment gave me much time to contemplate mine own power, and to build this."
Hm... A force of what would effectively be Sherrifs, each assigned to their own world, perhaps? It would definitely be a bit more reliable than the Guardians' two Lanterns per sector, managing dozens of worlds (if not
hundreds.)
I'm forced to compare this scaled-up personal lantern to my own work.
Well.
He had four hundred years.
Indeed. I'm sure you'll get the hang of it with
that long to work at it.
"And how are you doing for rings?"
"A trying task. E'en now, something of their nature defeats me."
Ah. Well, nobody's perfect. I bet he's been thinking of them as magic artefacts, not simply advanced technology...
"I've got to be honest here; I've been offloading a lot of the calculations regarding my more complex constructs onto my ring's AI."
"Can mine me repaired, do you know?"
I dunno, Kalmin doesn't really like to
repeat himself... But on the other hand, creating a Ring VI for a non-Guardian Green Ring... That would be an entertaining challenge for him, or his
students.
"It's probably-." Was Alan's repaired by his new personal lantern, or was it a completely fresh installation? "I would guess so, but I wouldn't know how to do it. Unless you felt like changing to orange?"
"You have your colour, while I have mine."
Indeed. I figure
any emotion in you is
so admixed with Will that it's like being
Enlightened...
"Though actually, this could be a useful training exercise. Would you mind if I brought my students in to have a look? We could brainstorm techniques together."
"You feel no hesitancy in conspiring against the Guardians?"
Pff, they don't like him much as it is. You think he's concerned about them liking him any
less?
"Well… The Guardians have gone a good job for millions of years. But they're hardly faultless, and… Ultimately, they're not the boss of me. I'd like to improve my own abilities and those of my students, and… Your situation could be one that my friend Alan is going to end up in eventually. Unlike the Guardians I don't have a particular problem with you ruling a Sector… I'm not signing up to make you King of the Galaxy of anything, but I see no reason not to cooperate at the moment."
Admittedly, if he becomes a problem down the line, things could get
interesting.
"Well said. I do not object to the presence of your students. Indeed, I am curious to meet more Lanterns than those I have encountered to date."
"Rightoh, I'll call them. Illustres to Lantern Xor. Are you finished?"
Well, this will be amusing for all involved. Dul, Onik and Xor are very
different people... I wonder what Malvolio will make of such diverse characters wielding the same light?
