Chapter 21
Betty and her friends were gathered around the TV watching the election results come in, and it wasn't going how they liked.
"…And it looks like the Trump-Lodge campaign is going to carry the state of North Carolina," Wolf Blitzer announced. "And with it they get the state's fifteen electoral college votes."
"Our election system makes no sense," Betty complained. "I mean Trump and Lodge can end up winning even if more people end up voting for Hillary."
Nearby Cheryl was sitting with her chin in her hands looking very worried. Barry went over and sat beside her and put an arm around her shoulder.
"Hey, it's going to be okay," Barry said reassuringly as possible.
"… at the moment the Republicans lead in Pennsylvania, Florida and Ohio," Wolf Blitzer continued. "The Democrats are going to need to make comebacks in the those three states if they're to having any hopes of taking the Oval Office."
"It's not looking good," Ginger moaned. "God I wish there was more we could do."
"… And CNN is calling it, the next President of the United States will be Donald Trump," Wolf Blitzer stated.
Betty and her friends stared at the TV all of them too stunned to speak. Jughead grabbed the remote and turned the TV off and they were still all quiet.
"Fuck!" Cheryl cursed breaking the silence.
Ginger said nothing and just hugged her. Betty and Barry looked at each other worriedly. This was not good for any of them.
One week later…
Reggie arrived at the Lodge Mansion, having been summoned by Hermione Lodge, the new Vice President-elect. The place was now guarded by members of the secret service who searched him before allowing him to enter. He was shown to the office, which had previously been her husband Hiram's, where Hermione was waiting sitting behind the desk. Also in the room was a black woman who Reggie didn't recognize who was sitting on the near side of the desk.
"Please close the door and give us some privacy," Hermione said to the secret service agents.
They nodded and closed the door. Hermione then gestured towards the empty chair next to the black woman. Reggie took the offered seat.
"Thank you for coming Reggie," Hermione said. "Allow me to introduce you to Amanda Waller."
Reggie turned to the black woman and offered his hand. The woman just stared at it until Reggie took his hand back.
"So what is this about?" Reggie asked. "I've been holding off on kill the Green Lantern because you asked me to."
"That's exactly what this is about," Hermione said. "I've got a plan that I think benefits all of us."
"Alright, I'm listening," Reggie said he crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair.
"I want you to kill Donald Trump," Hermione replied.
"What?" Reggie asked in surprise. "How the hell is that a benefit to any of us?"
"Well with him out of the way I'm the one in line to become President for starters," Hermione replied.
"Yeah, and I make myself public enemy number one, that's no benefit for me," Reggie stated.
"If you would let me finish," Hermione interrupted him. "Amanda and I have been working on a plan where you would frame the Green Lantern."
Reggie was surprised for a moment and the smiled. This was even better than killing Ginger; this would turn the whole country against her. It would ruin her life.
"Okay I'm liking this," Reggie said, then pointed his thumb at Waller. "But what does she's get out of it?"
"When I take office one of the first things I plan on doing is creating a taskforce responsible for capturing vigilantes and people with abilities and making them work for the government," Hermione replied. "Amanda here is to be in charge of this task force."
"Okay," Reggie said with a nod. "But killing Trump won't exactly be easy, and how are we going to frame the Green Lantern?"
"Well as an assistant director with the Secret Service, Amanda here can easily arrange for a time where Trump will be vulnerable," Hermione replied. "And I may be able to get my hands on some technology that would allow you to look exactly like the Green Lantern."
"Like a shape shifting technology?" Reggie asked.
"Sort of," Hermione replied. "But first I need to know, are you in?"
Reggie thought for moment. If this all went as planned it was a big win for him. However if something went wrong and he was caught, well was most certainly a dead man.
"Alright I'm in," Reggie agreed.
Veronica returned to the laboratory where she and Maxwell worked on inventions together and also kept their own fledgling team of super powered individuals. She used her access card to open the door to the facility but as she entered she found the place looking rather sparse. Half-complete ideas that she had been working on with Maxwell were gone as were several of the mainframes where they stored the data from their experiments and calculations. But most surprising was the fact that Maxwell was nowhere to be seen.
"Maxwell?" Veronica called out.
Following her mother's win in the election Veronica had gone about taking care of a number of business matters relating to her own shares in Lodge Industries and she had also visited with the King of Atlantis, Arthur, or Aquaman as Veronica called him in private, to discuss the outcome of the election with him and its implications on his kingdom. The plan had been for her and Maxwell to meet up at the lab today.
"Something isn't right," Veronica muttered to herself.
Just then Veronica's phone rang; she looked down to see it was a call from her mother. Veronica wasn't really in the mood to talk to her mother but she decided to answer the call anyway.
"What do you want mother?" Veronica asked as she answered the phone.
"Well I was calling to find out when you were going to congratulate me," Hermione replied.
Veronica suspected that the election had been fixed. She knew that her mother had connections with some unsavoury types who could help fix an election.
"Yeah, great job winning," Veronica said sarcastically. "If you don't mind I'm a little busy."
"Oh, with what?" Hermione inquired.
"Well I was supposed to meet up with Maxwell and I'm not sure where he is," Veronica replied.
"Oh well I'm sure he's rather busy himself," Hermione said in a strangely chipper tone.
"And how would you know?" Veronica asked suspiciously.
"Well I may have asked him to turn over all the research the two of you have done to the government, including those two speedsters you created and the Klump girl that you tried to have killed," Hermione said.
"What?" Veronica asked. "Maxwell would never do that!"
"No he would," Hermione responded.
"But… he…" Veronica stammered.
"Did you ever think about how the two of you met, your whirlwind romance and marriage?" Hermione asked. "That was all my idea."
"What?" Veronica muttered in disbelief.
"The Midge girl might have been able to make men do what she wants, but I've been doing it for far longer," Hermione stated.
"How long? How long have you and Maxwell…" Veronica asked.
"About three years," Hermione replied. "I'm the one that helped him get his father committed."
"You bitch," Veronica cursed.
"Hmm, well I'd love to chat dear but I am rather busy myself," Hermione replied. "What with being the next Vice President and all..."
With that Hermione disconnected the call. Veronica stood staring at her phone for a long moment. She then screamed and threw the phone on the ground and began stomping on it with her foot out of anger until it was just small pieces.
Veronica then took a moment to compose herself. She knew her mother and she knew that Hermione's plans weren't done yet. The odds were she was going to have Trump eliminated so that she would become President. Well if Veronica had any say in it then Hermione's time as President would be short lived, if she even got there.
Evening, Four days later…
Donald Trump and two secret service men waited for the elevator to arrive at Trump Tower. A moment later the elevator arrived and the doors opened. As it did Trump and his guards were surprised to see a girl standing inside. Trump quickly recognized her as the Green Lantern; one of the vigilantes he had been campaigning against. His guards both reached for their side arms.
Suddenly without a word she created two yellow spikes that impaled his guards in the head. They both dropped to the ground dead before they finished falling.
"Hey, hey now wait a minute, we can talk about this!" Trump said nervously.
The Green Lantern stepped forward and formed a yellow hand gun and placed it on Donald's forehead.
"Please don't," he begged. "I have a wife, kids, grandkids…"
She didn't let him finish but pulled the trigger and he fell backward splayed upon the ground. She then looked up at the nearby security camera, pointed the gun at it and shot it.
Betty and her friends were at the barn having game night. They were playing Cards Against Humanity and having a rather good time. It was slightly unusual in that Hal had decided to join them, usually he spent his evenings in the farmhouse.
They were just starting another round when Cheryl's phone began to ring. She looked down to see it was an unknown number.
"Just a second guys let me see who this is," Cheryl said. "Hello?"
"Cheryl Blossom, it's Veronica Lodge," the voice on the other end said.
"Veronica? What do you want?" Cheryl asked.
"Are you near a TV?" Veronica asked.
"Um, yeah," Cheryl replied.
"Turn it on, doesn't matter what station," Veronica said.
Cheryl motioned for Dilton to turn on the TV. Dilton did so and they were all shocked by what came up. Breaking News… President Elect Trump Assassinated By Green Lantern, was running on every station.
"What the hell is this?" Cheryl asked.
"Look I know you're friends with the Green Lantern, whoever she is," Veronica said. "And I'm pretty sure she didn't do this."
Just then the TV showed security camera footage of the assassination attempt.
"That's me!" Ginger exclaimed looking at the footage. "But I've never been in Trump Tower!"
"My mother recently got her hands on some advanced nano-technology that allows somebody to take on someone else's appearance," Veronica said. "I don't know who that is, but I know it's not your friend."
"How do you know about this technology?" Cheryl asked.
"Because I designed it along with my husband," Veronica replied. "And I just found out that he took everything we made together and turned it over to her, he's been working for her since before we met."
"Holy shit," Cheryl muttered.
"Your friend needs to leave, to hide," Veronica said. "She's about to become the most wanted person on the entire planet."
With that Veronica ended the call.
"What am I going to do?" Ginger asked worriedly.
Hal was staring at the screen watching the footage.
"Dilton, can you rewind it and pause it when I tell you to," Hal requested.
Dilton did as Hal asked.
"Look!" Hal exclaimed pointing. "The constructs that this fake is creating, they're yellow."
"So?" Barry asked.
"My ring creates green constructs," Ginger said.
"Exactly, which means this is somebody with a Yellow Power Ring," Hal explained. "Which means we've got an even bigger problem because that means that Sinestro has set his eyes on Earth."
"Who's Sinestro," Sheila asked.
"Sinestro used to be a Green Lantern. He and I were friends and we fought side by side," Hal replied. "However I discovered that Sinestro was using his powers as Green Lantern to rule his planet as a dictator. As a result Sinestro was stripped of his ring and banished. However Sinestro was able to find a way to harness the power of fear to create his own Yellow Power Rings which are just as powerful as Green Lantern Rings and create his own army. The two sides fought in a bloody violent battle which ended with Sinestro and his few remaining followers retreating. He's been hiding since, likely rebuilding his army's strength."
"So why would he be coming to Earth?" Betty asked.
"Probably to kill me," Hal replied. "He blames me for everything that's happened to him."
"So what do we do?" Dilton inquired.
"There's only one thing that can be done," Hal said.
He turned to Ginger and took a hold of her by the shoulders.
"You need to leave Earth and go to Oa and warn the other Green Lanterns," Hal told her.
"But…" Ginger said.
"No he's right," Cheryl agreed. "You're going to be wanted here, the safest place for you is to go to Oa."
"But my dad, he's going to wonder where I am? They're going to question him," Ginger said.
"We'll talk to your father," Hal reassured her. "I'm sure he knows that you didn't do this; we'll let him know that you're safe and where you've gone. But you need to leave now before they start looking for you."
Ginger stood up and looked at her ring and transformed into her Green Lantern costume in a green flash.
"You guys need to stop Hermione Lodge while I'm gone," Ginger said to Barry, Betty and Cheryl.
"Don't you worry about that," Betty said.
Ginger then took turns hugging everyone good-bye as they made their way outside of the barn. Once she had she took off into the sky as a green streak which the others watched until it had vanished. Everyone then went back into the barn except for Betty, Barry and Cheryl.
"We've got our work cut out for us," Betty said. "Especially since our enemy is about to become the President."
"What are we going to do?" Barry asked.
"There's not much we can do, at least not until she does become President," Cheryl replied. "She's working with this Yellow Power ring person obviously; so I'm guessing she's got different plans than Trump did. Plus she was married to Hiram and that guy tried to turn himself into an arch-demon to take over the world; I doubt she's much better."
Barry and Betty both nodded in agreement and the three of them felt rather nervous as they went back in the barn to join their friends.
A lot happened there! Maxwell has been working for Hermione this entire time? Reggie just framed Ginger and killed Trump? And what's going to happen now that Hermione is going to be President? Find out what in the next chapter! Please Review!