Note: This story is still in process of publication at the time of this publication the story has 11 chapters.
No copyright infringement intended; this is simply written for adult enjoyment. Green Lantern and other comic book characters and places belong to DC. The rest of the characters and concepts are property of the authors.
Green Lantern: The Emerald Downgrade
Authors (Plymouth58 and GoodTime)
Chapter 1
Kyle Rayner wasn’t having the best week.
After a year of working at the Daily Planet, he had just been informed that his weekly comic strip was coming to an end. Apparently, they had to tighten the budget a bit this year, and given the choice between keeping a fledgling comic book artist, or a seasoned reporter, something had to give. At least Clark got him the job in the first place. It was fun while it lasted.
The worst part about it was, even with a year’s worth of experience, Kyle was still finding it hard to get hired by other newspapers. Fortunately, he was able to wrangle some interviews with potential new editors. Unfortunately, he still had some bills to pay in the meantime.
He was right in the middle of negotiating his lease with his landlord when he got the terrible news about his job. Now that he was unemployed, his landlord definitely wasn’t going to renew the contract for his condo, and Kyle didn’t have the money for a deposit for a new place either.
With no job prospects and no new apartment, Kyle started packing his stuff up on autopilot, chucking all his stuff into unmarked boxes. He was actually making some pretty decent time, but as he waded through the back of his closet, he noticed something frilly poking out the top of a box.
Upon closer inspection, Kyle’s face broke into a grin. This box was filled with souvenirs from past romances. As he picked through the top contents of the box, he was filled with a sense of amusement and harmless nostalgia. However, the longer he rummaged through the box, the more his mood turned grey. The things at the bottom weren’t just sexy lingerie, but something more meaningful – heartfelt letters, faded photographs, dried-out flowers and even a stuffed bear that he brought one of his exes.
He’d forgotten what it was like to be in a fully committed relationship. Between his day job at the Daily Planet, and his nightly patrols as one of the Green Lanterns of sector 2814, he’d let his emotional and romantic life take a back seat. Over the past couple of years, what once were mementos of promising relationships, quickly got covered up by piles of lingerie that would have raised eyebrows across the inhabitants of Coast City.
Kyle just shook his head. What would the people of Coast City think if they knew that the noble superhero, Green Lantern, had a treasure trove of naughty souvenirs like this. Most of the stuff Kyle picked up were from one-night stands, women whose names and faces he can’t even remember anymore.
He rubbed a pair of pink satin lingerie in his hands and struggled to remember the girl who owned them. He had met her less than two weeks ago, and with a quick sniff at the fabric in his hands, he found that the cloying perfume was still attached to the soft fabric.
What about the girl who owned the ruffle, pink underwear bunched in the corner? He could still remember the taste of her lips, and the way her thighs felt as he slid her panties down her legs, but he couldn’t think of a single word she said to him that night.
Maybe he deserved all this bad karma that was happening to him. This box was a shrine to how little he cared about the consequences of his emotional and sexual lifestyle. Green Lanterns like him were meant to be virtuous and pure of heart, and he fondly remembered how proud he was that he overcame his fear and was chosen to become a hero. But now, he wasn’t even brave enough to commit to something real with a woman.
In an attempt to clear his head, Kyle did what he did best – he shook off his feeling of unease, and stepped out into the night as the noble Green Lantern. Still, as he was patrolling across the city, he couldn’t help but think that he needed a change.
‘Maybe it’s time to get some therapy, or something’, he thought as he flew across the city. As he absentmindedly scanned through the streets, something caught his attention: a pair of dirty jeans slipping through a window in one of the local S.T.A.R. facilities.
T-Bone dropped onto the linoleum in the dark lab with a thud. He hated going into places like this. It was filled with boring equipment that he had no idea how to use.
After watching his partner fail to open a locked shelf, T-Bone calls out to him. ‘I told you we should’ve gone to the liquor store, Chuy. We could’ve stolen something to drink by now, maybe even got some loose change for later. What’re we gonna with all this shit?’
Chuy tries to ignore T-Bone’s annoyed tone, and replies nonchalantly from across the room, ‘Hey, these things look pretty expensive, right? Imagine how much money we could make if we sold this. We could probably buy a liquor store!’ He was examining a table full of small white devices with black buttons.
‘That’s bullshit! I don’t even know what any of this crap is. Which means you don’t fucking know either.’
‘Keep your voice down!’ Much to Chuy’s disappointment, T-Bone was right. It’s not like there were any instructions on these things, but he wasn’t going to admit that out loud. ‘Besides, we can come back with Poncho, and…
’T-Bone pipes up as Chuy trails off, ‘That fucker wouldn’t give us more than 10 bucks for all this shit. And that’s if we find him in a good mood.’
‘Come on, man, we’re already here. Cut it out and just help me find something that we can take with us.’
‘We don’t even know what half of this stuff is! How am I gonna know what we’re meant to take?’
Chuy sighed. T-Bone was one hot piece of ass, but he could be pretty unbearable when he wasn’t high. But, oh well, just got to work around it. ‘Well, you probably don’t know what any of them are because of those sunglasses. Take them off, I’m sure you can’t see shit with them. Make yourself useful and pull out the stuff from that glass box. I’m sure those white knicknacks are worth something.’
‘What even are they,’ T-Bone asks as he pulls his sunglasses up and inspects one of the tiny white things.
‘I don’t know, but they look like fucking iPhones and all that other stuff we saw at the Macstore. I’m sure we can sell them for something.’
T-Bone cursed under his breath as he walks over to a discarded cardboard box in the corner. He picks it up, walks back to the glass box, and just sweeps all the stuff into the box with his arms.
‘Don’t forget the big one,’ Chuy yells off from the side.
‘That shit?’ T-Bone rolls his eyes. ‘It’s as big as a fucking blender! I’m sure it isn’t worth the effort. The sweat from my ass will probably get us more money.
’Chuy was starting to lose his temper. He clenched his fist, feeling the rings on each finger tighten up as he fought the urge to pick a fight with his lover. ‘Just trust me! It’s some sort of digital camera or something. Just bring it here, damn it! And take those papers, too. Those might be the instructions.
‘Now come over here and help me with this.’ Chuy starts adding more stuff into T-Bone’s already full cardboard box, with a couple of cables in for good measure.
The irritation clear in his voice, T-Bone pipes up, ‘That’s enough, man! You’re putting too much stuff in. I don’t want to drop none of this shit on our way out. It’s way too heavy now.’
‘Put those muscles to work then. I can’t believe you’re that big and you’re complaining about carrying a tiny box. Do you have the keys?’
‘Yeah, they’re in my pocket. And I’m not worried about the weight of it. I don’t think this box can handle all the stuff in it. Let’s get the fuck out of here before it breaks.’ T-Bone fiddles around with the box as Chuy starts heading for the window.
‘I’m sure we’re gonna get less than 10 bucks for this shit,’ T-Bone mumbles to himself as he readjusts the box on his arm. Unbeknownst to him, Kyle Rayner, bathed in a glowing green aura, was standing right behind him. As T-Bone looks back up and notices the light, he turns around and sees the local superhero.
‘I don’t know,’ Green Lantern says with a cocky grin, ‘I’ll be happy to trade something for all that stuff. How does five years’ jail time sound?’ T-Bone turns around and sees the superhero in all his muscled glory, standing with his arms crossed.
‘Oh, shit, it’s you again!’ T-Bone exclaims in a panic. Chuy turns around and notices the superhero for the first time, and starts sprinting towards the window.
Thinking quickly on his feet, Green Lantern’s power ring surges, and a row of bars made of glowing green light materialises in front of the windows. And the doors. Oh, shit. Satisfied that he’s got everything under control, the superhero turns to T-Bone and acknowledges what he just said.
‘Have we met before?’ Kyle says as he looks the thug up and down. T-Bone was slightly shorter than him, and probably the same age. He was muscular, but a bit on the stocky side, with the typical Latino haircut: close-cropped black hair, two shaved lines down the sides of his head. He was wearing baggy pants with some holes in them, and a white tank top that was a bit too tight, and clearly hasn’t been washed recently. Kyle fought the urge to sneer at how hairy the dude was. He had a stringy looking goatee, big protruding lips, and beady black eyes. A pair of fake diamond studs in his ears finished off the ensemble.
Nope, definitely not someone Kyle would associate with in real life, that’s for sure. To be honest, he was a little grossed out by T-Bone.
‘Sure we know each other, motherfucker.’ T-Bone replies with a grimace. ‘You sent me to jail three years ago.’
Kyle didn’t particularly like profanity, and he fought the urge to teach T-Bone a lesson for calling him that word. He tried being sympathetic to all these people, but he was in a particularly bad mood tonight. Luckily, he was able to suppress the urge to start an actual brawl with this dude. After all, he was a Green Lantern. He had an image to uphold.
Shaking the feeling of annoyance, Green Lantern responds, ‘Well, I’m sure the wardens miss you. Come on, put everything back where you found them, and maybe I’ll put in a good word for you at the station.’
T-Bone, defeated, turns to Chuy. ‘I told you this was a bad idea.’
Chuy starts walking over, and fires back, ‘Hey, the liquor store wasn’t any better! That’s where Green Moron here caught you in the first place.’
That nickname got Kyle’s attention. He was trying to be nice, but these two lowlifes are starting to piss him off. This isn’t normally like him, but he’s just been having the worst day of his life, and some thug just calls him a moron to his face. With a scowl, he turns to the two thugs and goes, ‘What did you just call me?’
As the superhero starts skulking towards them, Chuy and T-Bone start backing up. Chuy grabs T-Bone’s arm in fear, which, unfortunately, causes T-Bone to lose his grip on the box. As he expected, the box starts breaking because it can’t handle the weight. All the stuff in it starts spilling out onto the floor. T-Bone tries to stop what was happening, but it’s too late. He just stares in fear at Green Lantern, wondering what the hero will do to them now.
The last thing that hit the ground was the device that looked like a digital camera. When that happened, it emitted a bright white flash right in the superhero’s glaring eyes.
Green Lantern seemed to stop in his tracks, the glare from his eyes gone. He now looked dazed, like he lost his train of thought. Blinking slowly, all he could muster was a confused, ‘What? Uhm…’
Still fearing for their life, Chuy and T-Bone start backing up away from all the stuff they dropped. Chuy turns to T-Bone and whispers, ‘You moron! Look what you did!’
Cowering in fear, neither of them had noticed the change in Green Lantern’s demeanor. All he cared about was getting as far away from the hero as possible.
T-Bone whispers back, ‘Hey, it wasn’t my fault. I told you the box wasn’t sturdy enough.’ T-Bone’s still staring at Green Lantern in fear, but he’s noticed that the hero has stopped moving.
Chuy hasn’t yet though. He’s pretty frustrated at T-Bone’s excuses. In his normal, authoritative voice, he goes, ‘Cut the crap, moron. Pick all that shit off that floor, now!’
To the surprise of both thugs, the muscled superhero in front of them springs back to attention. He starts walking in their direction, and they both close their eyes in fear. After a few beats, they realise that they’re both fine, and as they look up, they noticed that the muscle superhero wasn’t coming over to beat them to a pulp.
He was bending over in front of them, cardboard box now in hand with a green glow surrounding it. He was picking up the devices off the floor and neatly packing them up in the box. The reinforced green box had no trouble holding the weight of the devices.
T-Bone just watched, mouth agape, as the superhero starts cleaning up after their mess. And he liked the view every time GL bent over to pick something up. The devices were pretty small so he had to bend over quite a bit. He kept his knees straight all throughout the process so that the box would stay upright, giving both a nice view of his ass and legs.
With the glowing green box almost filled back up, Green Lantern bends over to pick up the last thing on the floor – the device that emitted the strange white light. At this point, Chuy finally pipes up. ‘Uh… Dude?’ As soon as Green Lantern hears him, GL freezes, look over with a glazed look in his eyes, and listens to Chuy intently. He was still bent over at the hips, with his ass out, his big muscled arms reaching for the last device.
Chuy continues, ‘I wasn’t talking to you? I was talking to my partner?’
At this point, it’s almost like a switch goes off in Green Lantern’s brain. The box instantly lost its green glow and the hero dropped it, and all its contents, back on the floor. He stood up, facing Chuy and T-Bone, but there was something off about him. His previously heroic posture was gone. He looked less poised, and he held a more relaxed posture. His shoulders were narrowed, like he was slumped over, with his neck bending to the front, almost like he was bowing while trying to maintain eye contact with the two thugs.
In a sluggish tone, the formerly cocky superhero replied with an, ‘I’m sorry, Siiirrrrr…’ None of the confidence and bravado was left in his tone.
Chuy looks at him with confusion. ‘Wha… what did you just say?’
‘I said, I’m sorry, Siir…’ Green Lantern repeated in the same slow bovine voice he used before.
‘What the fuck is wrong with you?’ Chuy said, amazement in his voice.
‘I don’t know, Siiiir…’ Chuy stared at the superhero as he answered. It felt like an eternity had passed. Green Lantern stared forward, slack-jawed and mouth hanging open, in the same odd posture as before. Shouldn’t he be taking them to jail or something?
T-Bone finally snapped out of his own confusion and he walked over the hero. He passed his hand twice in front of Green Lantern’s face. No reaction. He stood right in front of him, and stretched up until they were face to face. Green Lantern’s eyes were slightly crossed, and his pupils were fully dilated.
‘Oh, man. That thing with the flashing light. I think it fried his brain or something. He’s barely even blinking right now. I think we’ve lucked out, bro. Let’s get out of here!’
‘How the fuck are we gonna do that, Einstein? All the exits are sealed with those bars of light. Those are unbreakable, and only he can get rid of him. I think we have to snap him out of this if we want to go anywhere.
‘Oh fuck, where are those instructions? He must’ve put them in this box somewhere. Hey, T-Bone, make yourself useful and look for those sheets of paper. Let’s see if we can figure out what the fuck happened and how we can fix it.
‘And make sure you don’t touch that thing. It must be some sort of weapon. We wouldn’t get fucked up like our friend over there.’
From time to time, they would glance over their shoulders at the mighty Green Lantern, only he wasn’t looking so mighty. He just stood there the whole time, with the same pose and the same vacant expression. They eventually noticed some drool start falling out of his open mouth. They landed on his muscled pec at first, and the superhero made no move to clean it off. He just kept drooling, as his spit kept dropping down, eventually hitting the floor.
After a couple of minutes, Chuy found a bunch of papers with drawings of the machine. These must be the instructions! He starts skimming through the notes as he waves T-Bone over.
Chuy starts reading out loud, ‘Hmmmmmmm… I don’t know… neuronal… something… mmmhh… neural cor- correlation… light stim- stimulisium… hmmm… blah-blah… brain lobes… plural… plural cortices… what a fuck is that? Hmmmm…’
With a confused look on his face, T-Bone just expectantly says, ‘Well?’
‘I don’t know! It says something about brains being susceptible to photography or some shit like that.’
‘Yeah, I’m sure Green Faggot over there loves a good photo op, but why is he drooling like an idiot?’
T-Bone looked at Green Lantern again. By now, the usually proud and imposing Green Lantern was anything but picture-worthy. His slumped shoulders, coupled with his knees starting to bend slightly, and his crossed eyes and drooling slack-jawed mouth, he looked like a mentally handicapped man waiting for his turn for the bathroom.
Chuy keeps reading out of the hand-out, ‘Hmmmmm… receptive to suggestion… subjects have deve-devoli- devolping strange organic reactions… what the hell are “strange organic reactions”?’
Looking at the formerly threatening Green Lantern with a grin, T-Bone was starting to feel more relaxed. He fires back with a joke, ‘That’s you when I ride your ass. You always have strange orgasmic reactions.’
‘Shut up!’ Chuy says with a playful tone in his voice. ‘Oh… mental suggestions… hypnotized state… I think the poor bastard is hypnotised!’
‘Yeah, right.’
‘No, seriously. I think that thing over there is made to hypnotise people!’
‘Bullshit!’ T-Bone turns away from Chuy, and looks at the superhero. ‘Hey, you, Green Dumbass! Cluck act like a chicken!’ T-Bone said, snapping his fingers.
The last thing he expected was to see the hero bending over some more, going straight down to his haunches with his knees bent. With his muscled arms bent to the side, and his ass sticking straight out, the big bad superhero starts bobbing his head while clucking and hawking! ‘Buck, buck, buck,’ the hero starts saying with full conviction.
The two thugs start laughing hysterically at this point, as the hunk of a hero, proud defender of Coast City, starts strutting around bowlegged. Green Lantern doesn’t even notice the laughter. In his head, all that matters is finding the next piece of corn to eat off the ground.
‘Buck, buck, buck!’
Continues…
