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SM/DC Chapter 152 : Fear's Chosen
🕑 Added 2025-06-18 23:06:41 +0000 UTCArthur stood in the threshold of the arena’s exit, his shadow stretching long beneath the stark white lights overhead. The scent of scorched steel and the faint hum of residual energy still clung to the air behind them. Kara remained at his side, eyeing him carefully as he stood motionless clearly deep in thought.
His expression was unreadable, but something about the way his jaw set, the weight behind his gaze as it stared past nothing in particular, said more than words could.
Kara, shifting her weight onto one leg, finally broke the silence.
“So… what are you going to do now?”
Arthur blinked. Slowly. Like surfacing from somewhere far away. He turned to her, his voice low and composed.
“I’ll say hello.”
Kara tilted her head, one brow arching. “Alone?”
His lips curved faintly not quite a smile.
Kara folded her arms, narrowing her eyes. “Should we notify the League? I mean this is kind of a big deal, isn’t it?”
Arthur exhaled through his nose, calm and quiet. He closed his eyes for a brief moment as if listening to something far beyond her reach. Then he opened them again, sharp and aware.
“Their hands are full,” he said plainly.
Kara stepped forward. “Wait—what does that mean?”
“There’s a battle,” Arthur said, turning toward the glowing interface still displaying red pulses of movement. “Outside the Watchtower. Mid-orbit skirmish. Just started.”
“What?” Kara’s voice pitched higher. She moved beside him, eyes flicking across the screen. “Already?”
“Dozens of them,” Arthur confirmed. “Yellow Lanterns. Looks like a frontal assault.”
Kara’s expression darkened. “If that’s the case it’s not a recruitment drive. This is war.”
Arthur nodded. “You can go help, I’ll deal with what we have here.”
Her blue eyes flicked toward him. “No I’ll stay with you but uhh are… we just gonna ignore it?”
“No,” he replied, firm but not unkind. “We trust them. The League can hold the line. That’s what they’re built for and the least they can do. Besides if this was meant for me, then this whole thing’s a distraction.”
He turned to face her fully now, his posture relaxed, but his tone anything but.
“We check here in Gotham first. That’s where one of them landed. That’s where I say hello.”
Kara stared at him for a moment, her breath caught between defiance and understanding. She hated leaving a battle behind, hated the idea of not flying directly into the storm. But she knew Arthur he wasn’t someone who ignored danger.
He just dealt with it… differently.
Kara finally nodded. “Alright. let's teach them a lesson.”
Arthur spoke his voice calm and commanding.
“Lex.”
Shadow Lex stepped forward from the darkness at the back of the lab, hands neatly folded behind his back, his posture impeccable, but his gaze remained perfectly humancold, efficient, and loyal only to Arthur.
“The arena needs improvements,” Arthur said. “If it can’t handle Kara at half steam, it’s not ready for anything worse. Reinforce it. You should have collected enough data by now.” Lex gave a single nod.
Arthur then turned slightly toward Owl, who was still monitoring the expanding map on the central computer, silently tracking energy signatures that flickered in and out of sensor range.
“Owl,” Arthur called, “continue mapping the Lantern energy. I want you to keep track of them, like a path algorithm. Show me where they’ve been and where they’re going.”
Owl said nothing, but turned his featureless head toward Arthur. A pulse of light shimmered through his violet eyes. Then he simply nodded and returned to the console, already pulling threads from the energy traces like a spider weaving a web of data.
Arthur gave one last glance at the vast lab, his base, his command center. Built with shadows and science. Lex and Owl would manage things in his absence.
He turned to Kara, already standing beside him with a question in her eyes.
Arthur held out his hand toward her without a word. She took it.
“Exchange,” he whispered.
****
Arkham Asylum loomed like a relic from a forgotten nightmare its gothic spires clawing at the air, windows blackened and silent, hiding horrors no sane man ever wanted to witness.
Arthur and Kara hovered silently in the sky, their capes stirring in the wind, the only motion in the dead hush above the asylum.
Kara crossed her arms, her jaw tight. “I hate this place, you know,” she muttered, glancing down with a scowl. “I can’t stand it.”
Arthur’s eyes never left the building. “Would’ve been weird if you said you did,” he replied dryly. “It’s a place made to cage freaks. Rot eats away at this place from the inside out.”
There was something in his voice an edge, not of fear, but of disgust.
He squinted, his blue gaze narrowing as he focused on a very specific wing of the asylum’s interior. Shadows stirred faintly beneath his boots.
“What I don’t understand,” he muttered, “is why that Lantern is here.”
Kara floated a little closer, her blonde hair catching the moonlight. “You sure your shadow soldier didn’t make a mistake?”
Arthur didn’t answer immediately. He simply exhaled, eyes flicking toward the building.
‘Owl is literally Batman with less restraint, he thought. I doubt he’d screw up a basic track-and-trace.’
“No,” he said aloud, calmly. “I don’t think so.”
Kara moved beside him, just enough for her shoulder to graze his. “Could they be trying to recruit inmates?” she asked. “Looking for people desperate enough to join them?”
Arthur shook his head. “No. The Sinestro Corps doesn’t want the broken or lost. They want those who inspire fear. Command it.”
He trailed off.
And then his expression darkened as the thought clicked.
“Fear…” he murmured. “Of course. There’s someone here who lives off it. An expert in it.”
Kara blinked. “Who?”
Arthur’s voice was cold as a blade. “Scarecrow.”
A gust of wind passed over them. Arthur turned “Let’s go inside.”
Kara gave a tight nod, her expression focused. No quips this time. No hesitation.
They both angled downward Arthur descending like a streak of living dusk, Kara right behind him, her flight more a meteor’s fall than a glide.
****
THE WATCHTOWER – ORBIT
The black canvas of space was torn open by war.
Amid a backdrop of stars, the battlefield above Earth burned with streaks of emerald and malicious gold. Dozens of Sinestro Corps lanterns moved in tight, predatory formations each one trailing constructs of spears, serpents, and jagged fear-forged machines, all pulsating with sickly yellow light.
But they weren’t alone.
The Justice League had answered.
Superman surged through the void like a crimson comet, cape trailing behind him like a war banner. His fists glowed with residual solar energy as he rammed through constructs and shields alike, sending yellow lanterns scattering with explosive force. With heat vision carving arcs through space, he was relentless, precise and deadly.
In the center of it all, two beams clashed.
Hal Jordan and Sinestro.
Green and yellow collided in a kinetic storm of light, sound, and energy each strike a symbol of opposing philosophies. Hal’s jaw was clenched in fury, his ring burning with every ounce of his will.
“I know what you’re doing here,” Hal growled, bracing his shield against a barrage of yellow blades. “And I won’t let it happen.”
Sinestro hovered just beyond him, regal in his sadism, yellow constructs coiling around him. His eyes gleamed like twin suns of malice. “Ah... you’re still so predictable, Jordan. Noble. Naïve.”
The yellow energy around his ring pulsed stronger, more focused. “You should know this by now Green lantern. A ring chooses its bearer. It doesn’t ask permission. It chooses and it only chooses those worthy of its power. Those who can inspire what others cannot.” He leaned in just slightly, yellow light flickering in the edges of his sharp gaze. “And when fear is your foundation, there’s nothing stronger. So tell me, Hal... what fear do you think lives inside him?”
Hal’s jaw clenched. “Doesn’t matter. He’s not one of you.”
“Perhaps not yet,” Sinestro said with a slow, measured calm. “But that’s the thing about fear. It only needs a moment... and it lingers far longer than ‘Will’ ever could.”
He raised his hand, and a massive construct formed a snarling, skeletal beast with jagged wings made of screaming faces.
“You’re too late to do anything, Green Lantern. We aren’t here for you. You were just... the welcome mat.”
Sinestro’s voice echoed like thunder.
“You can’t stop us.”
With a thunderous roar, the construct lunged Hal met it mid-flight, will against nightmare, as their rings screamed against each other.
From behind, Martian Manhunter, phasing through a Sinestro soldier, turned to Superman and transmitted a thought.
“There’s something wrong. This isn’t their main force. This is too contained. They’re keeping us occupied.”
Superman’s eyes narrowed, glowing brighter. “A diversion...”
Comments
Cobalt
Honestly I know it's been said before but the black lanterns are a shout tbh, whether Arthur corrupts the yellow lantern ring or gets sent one it could definitely be interesting
DarkVerse
Honestly, I don't want to die before I see Arthur fuck siniestro and the other flashlights.
