Author: Cyclone
Feedback: Please be gentle.
Distribution: Gimme credit and a link.
Rating: Just a little bad language.
Spoilers: Anything and everything.
Disclaimer: The characters depicted herein belong to other people. I'm just borrowing them for a while.
Summary: After Halloween, everything changes. Sequel to Blackest Night. Part one of Emerald Flame.
Author's Note: Okay, y'know, the reason Blackest Night was originally a one-shot was because I saw only two ways to expand on it: Green Lantern Xander and Future Knowledge Xander. Both of them had already been done and done well by others, and I didn't want to retread ground already covered, so I intended to leave it as is.
Then I got this idea.
It was the night of November 1st, 1997, and Xander walked down the darkened street, fingering the ring he wore on his right hand. He wasn't surprised by the way Buffy had exploded when he told them about the loophole in Angel's curse. It hurt, but it didn't surprise him.
There were so many things he hadn't told them, but at the top of the list was what he'd tried to do here, when he realized where and when he was.
Last night -- Halloween night -- Xander had dressed as a Green Lantern. Instead of turning into a random Green Lantern or Hal Jordan or Kyle Rayner, he had turned into a future version of himself, one that had been stranded in a futuristic DC universe and became that time's Green Lantern of Sector 2814.
It hadn't taken him long to figure out where and when he was when the spell started, and he had come up with a wild idea. He only hoped it worked. He thought it did, but seeing as how he had passed out almost immediately after, he wasn't sure. The first part had been easy: He had used his power ring to duplicate itself. It was one of the standard GLC power ring's many abilities.
He fingered the ring again. That had obviously worked. When he had regained consciousness, the ring he had been wearing when the spell started -- the first power ring -- had reverted to the cheap plastic ring he'd bought from Ethan's, but the created ring had remained.
The second part of his plan was to call his power battery to him. He'd nearly given himself an aneurysm trying to pull it to him across space, time, and the multiverse -- or perhaps simply creating it; he couldn't be sure -- but he vaguely remembered seeing it appear and using the new ring to hide it. The strain of what he had tried had apparently been too much for Ethan's spell to handle, because it appeared to have ended right around the time he passed out.
And that was why he was here.
He raised his right hand and clenched it into a fist. The ring began to glow as he willed it to work. On the street, the green, lantern-shaped power battery shimmered into a visibility and floated to his left hand.
"Hot damn," he whispered in awe. "It actually worked."
He cleared his throat and opened his mouth, but before any words left his mouth, he stopped and frowned. Sure, he had his own oath, but that didn't seem appropriate right here, right now. Besides, it was a private oath to himself, one he would never allow anyone else to hear if he could help it. As he began to charge the ring, he spoke, his voice growing stronger and more confident with each word:
"In brightest day, in blackest night,
No evil shall escape my sight.
Let all who worship evil's might
Beware my power, Green Lantern's light!"
He felt the familiar uniform settle around him as the ring flashed with power. It was only one ring. Only one of the most powerful weapons in the universe. Or perhaps, simply the most powerful weapon in the universe. Singular and unique in a world without the Corps.
It was a beginning. An emerald dawn.
No, he thought. More of an emerald spark. One little light, all alone, in the night.
With that thought on his mind, he sent a mental command to the ring and shot toward the heavens, enveloped in green energy.
"Oh, Spiiike!" Drusilla's voice keened through the factory plaintively.
"What is it, Dru?" Spike hurried to his lover's side.
"It's coming," she said, her voice hushed with excitement and fear. "The emerald flame is coming, and it will burn us all."
Author's Postscript:
You asked for it; you got it.
As if Green Lantern Xander or Future Knowledge Xander wasn't enough...
One of three special Halloween posts.