Chapter 5:
Several hours had passed before the ring began to ping. The moon had come out as Green Lantern turned towards the direction of the source, which seemed to be coming from an area in northern Montana near the Canadian border. His heart began to beat faster when the ring began to ping rapidly. He stopped, hovering over a multitude of trees that looked to be obscuring a small cabin.
John reached out with his mind, hoping that the little wooden shelter housed a sleeping Shayera Hol. The projections revealed the cabin as being empty. However the ring did find something...
"Feathers...?"
He descended slowly to the front of the cabin. That's odd... he thought. It looked as if the door had been kicked in... Using the ring like a spotlight, John walked into the small room. He decided to use thermal detection as well, hoping that he could determine how long she'd been here. He spied thermal prints of small footsteps near the window, but the footsteps were larger at the entrance of the cabin. John placed the spotlight onto the cabin's door and sure enough it had a thermal footprint on it as well. The size of the footprint matched the ones in the entryway but not at the window. Is that Shayera's footprint at the window...? At the door... no way... Did she meet someone? Why would the door be kicked in...? The questions were starting to cloud his mind.
John pointed his power ring at the feathers, which were near the fireplace. The projections phased down to its molecular level, until it reached the DNA strand. Then John mentally brought up the imprinted strand from Shayera's blood sample and compared the two. They were identical. "She was here..." he sighed with relief.
John walked back out of the cabin and scanned the perimeter. There were many other footprints in the small clearing that looked as if they came from the north. What's goin' on here...?
He spotted another group of feathers close to the doorway of the cabin and proceeded to scan it. The feather's DNA was similar, but it didn't match Shayera's. "Thanagarian...?" John questioned.
He looked inside the doorway again and decided that there were no signs of a struggle. Is it possible that Shayera left the cabin before they got here...? John rationalized. Did she go with them willingly?
Shay...
The energy axe came from behind and up above, but Lantern raised a field up before it could strike him and it careened off him harmlessly. He turned to face his assailant, when a Thanagarian soldier swooped from the sky and dove into him.
Lantern rolled with the punch throwing the soldier clear from him, and landed to his feet in a crouch, his green eyes smoldering. His hands shimmered to emerald green as he created a six-foot staff.
He held it loosely with both hands when the first soldier rushed with his energy club held high to strike him in the head. Lantern side stepped to the right, parried the energy club with his staff by swinging the left side down, then followed with a blunt chop to the back of the Thanagarian's head with the right side while maintaining one fluid arc. The Thanagarian went limp as he fell in a heap to the ground.
The other rushed from the right, but met with a sharp poke to the mid section and a well-placed swing of the staff across the face that sent the winged man crashing into the side of the wooden cabin.
John looked around to see if there were any other soldiers. When he was satisfied that there weren't, he willed the staff away. These two were staking the cabin out... "They're trying to capture her..." he thought.
Lantern removed the gear from each soldier, and placed it in a pile near the cabin. He took their clothing, what little they had, and used it to bound and gag them. He then picked them up and placed them inside the cabin.
John focused on the gear that they carried, two communicators and two energy weapons. Using his ring, he picked up a communicator and began to scan it. Using his thermal imaging he was able to tell what buttons were used the most.
Lantern turned it on hoping to get some loose chatter...since no one would suspect that this little invasion had been discovered. "Static... spotted her on heading northeast...static... going into cloud basin... static..."
Green Lantern leaped up into the air, carrying the gear that he'd commandeered, and headed northeast. With that turn, suddenly... the power ring started to ping.
He shot across the night sky praying he wasn't too late.