13th February 2013
21:06 GMT -5
B'dg and I approach the kiosk. I'm smiling brightly, but apparently B'dg feels that professional detachment is a better mien.
"Hello sirs, and welcome to Talok IV." The mature woman manning the desk has the usual blue skin of her species, but her hair is streaked with grey rather than being the matte black of her younger counterparts. She blinks after completing her first line of her spiel, her eyes focusing on the lantern sigils on our chests. "O
h-h. Do you-? Do you want to talk to the Interior Ministry?"
"No.
" / "Yes."
She looks from me to him and back again. "Um…"
"He does, because the Green Lantern Corps has a cooperation agreement with your government. I don't, because I'm just a nosy parker.
"
"This
is a tourist information kiosk, sir." Her eyes move to B'dg. "Would you like the Interior Ministry to send a car, or would you like to speak with them in a private booth?"
"Booth, thanks. If I need to talk to someone in person I'll just fly there."
She points to the right. "Just through there, sir, the privacy shield will engage once you're inside."
"
Thanks." B'dg flies off, and the sound cuts out a moment later.
"What would you like to know, Orange Lantern?"
"Okay, so, I'm looking for someone I'm pretty sure came to this planet sometime in the last year.
" I generate a construct image of Peldak.
"She also had a power ring.
"
"While we don't habitually track our visitors, I
can help you navigate our public information systems. Unless visitors set a 'no monitoring' order,
that's usually enough to work out approximately where they are."
"I love visiting other planets sometimes. It's like being at home a couple of decades in the future.
"
She looks like she doesn't quite know how to take that.
"Fine. Please do a perfectly legal search. Her name's Peldak.
"
She begins pressing buttons.
I could… Bypass the whole thing, obviously. Ring-hack their computer systems and access all of their logs. But Talok isn't on fire, and since Peldak doesn't seem like the sort to register her flight plans, finding out where she's gone if she's
not still here will rely on Dreamer. And Talok is in a Sector with two mid-tier Green Lanterns, is civilised, prosperous, on good terms with its neighbours and… Generally, it's the sort of place I wouldn't mind Earth having as a neighbour, or turning into. Heck, they even have a culture of superheroes, and that's
really rare in the galaxy.
Sure, they've all got the same
power, but the principle is the same. And that cultural background is probably why this woman is being so accommodating. The only bad thing about it is its proximity to some Dominion tributaries, which is how Ms. Mallor came a cropper, and that's hardly their fault.
"I'm not seeing a 'Peldak'. Is your image life size?"
"Yes. Ah, hang on.
" I generate Peldak's name in local standard phonics.
"Try that? Or Indigo Lantern?
"
"I don't think that she came through a port access portal."
"No, she'd probably just have flown down.
"
"We do
discourage that."
"Her species usually faint if anything happens anywhere near them. She's let the fact that she doesn't do that any more go to her head.
"
"Ah… No, nothing-. Oh."
"Oh?
"
"I was looking for 'indigo', and I found several mentions of a shower of indigo lights over one of the Shadow Champion hermitages about half a year ago." She presses a button to call up an image. It's the right shade of indigo, certainly. "We discourage that sort of thing as well, but the police investigation didn't turn up anything and the Champions didn't think it was worth worrying about."
"I know what a Shadow Champion is, but I don't know what the significance of the hermitages is.
"
"They're the sacred sites where they go to meditate on the power of the Father of Shadows to activate their own. Disturbing them is
very illegal. Have you met a Shadow Champion before?"
"Yes, and there's a man on my homeworld with the same sort of ability.
"
"Which one did you meet?"
"Lyrissa Mallor.
"
"Ah. Yes, she gave herself to the Dominion to save an entire world. A noble sacrifice in the finest-."
I frown.
"You do know she's still alive, right?
" She looks surprised.
"The Dominion were keeping her at a prison I liberated. I sort of assumed that she'd have got back in touch with her homeworld by now. Has she..? Not?
"
"I… If she
has then it's not been publically announced. It… Might cause trouble with the Dominion if they… If they saw her."
"Normally I'd say 'to heck with them', but I've got quite a lot of war on my plate already. I'll have a word with her. Who do I need to talk to about visiting the hermitage?
"
"By visiting-. You can't go
inside the hermitage; that would contradict it's-"
"Of course.
"
"-entire purpose. If you want to visit the
site, then the person to talk to is
Lyssa Drak."
…
This is presumably
before she met-. Before she joined the Sinestro Corps.
I don't remember the comics really… Covering her back story. I mean, she must have done
something with her time before becoming the Sinestro Corps' personnel officer on Qward. And she definitely hasn't visited Qward in
this timeline.
Honestly, I hadn't even realised that she was from here. I thought that she was just some blue woman Sinestro picked up somewhere.
"Okay, great. Can you make me an appointment, or do I need to talk to someone else?
"
"I can
request an appointment."
"Please do. I'd like to bring a few friends along, but we can make it just Lantern B'dg and I if she prefers.
"
"I will send a message now. I-." B'dg
flies back in, looking unhappy. "Is something wrong, Green Lantern?"
"The Guardians aren't happy about this."
"How unhappy?
"
"The entire Corps is getting put on alert to find these people."
"Makes my life easier.
"
"They want the whole thing shut down. It was her using the green light that pushed them over."
I shrug.
"As long as they wait until the Anti-Life is gone, that's fine with me.
"
That's a combination.
