I just froze there, right on the sidewalk. What should I do? Was the question that blew through my head on repeat. I figured that I should pull out my cell phone, and call the police. That was the most logical thing to do, right? But something stopped me. I don't know what it was. Curiosity? Intuition? I had no idea.

I don't know what urged me towards that porch. What compelled me through that overgrown sea of grass, which looked like it hadn't been cut in years? Whatever it was, unbeknownst to me, it was going to change my whole life.

My long, brown hair stuck to my face. I was constantly having to blink rain out of my eyes. The grass I currently trudged through clung to my legs and feet, ripping out of the ground as I kept walking. My feet sunk in the mud with every step I took. It was almost as if the Earth was trying to keep me from reaching that porch.

I could feel water and mud leaking into my ratty old tennis shoes. Well, the rest of me was soaked. Why not my socks, too? My feet hit something hard. I looked down, and I could just barely make out cracked pieces of cement that were most likely part of a walkway at some point. Now, they were overrun by grass. The pieces crunched under my weight.

At first, when I reached the broken stairs, I thought the being laid out across them dead. He certainly looked it. He had gashes, bruises, and limbs sticking out at unnatural angles. He was muscled, and I could barely make out the slightest rise and fall of his chest. His hair was black, and it was tousled, spiking outwards at the tips, which fell to his chin in layers. He almost looked human. I would have thought he was, except that his skin was a light purple color. And that he was clothed in a skin tight green suit, which seemed to be glowing and flickering out, only to light back up again. A symbol was on his chest, a circle with a line on top of it and on the bottom of it. The suit was the only thing that looked the slightest bit familiar.

It was on the news, about a year ago. A man, in a suit very similar to the one I was looking at right now, had saved hundreds of lives, by summoning a green racetrack out of thin air. A helicopter had gone down, but the racetrack had eventually returned it safely to the ground, with only minimal casualties.

There had been a few more occurrences of the same kind of thing, of the man flying through the sky, sitting on rooftops, and battling the entity he referred to as Paralax. He would disappear with no notice for a time, and then reappear just as quickly.

They had called him a Green Lantern. Most of the images I had seen – almost all of which were blurry beyond recognition – showed him to have short, brown hair. He, like the Green Lantern before me, seemed to have been quite muscular as well.

I found myself kneeling on the broken steps next to the wounded alien. They creaked and groaned under my weight, threatening to collapse right out from under my knees. The stairs shifted slightly, and the alien hissed in pain, his eyes flying open. They were a bronze color, and the streetlights' glow glinted in their depths.

He took in the wood above him, and his eyes dulled to a more brown color. He closed his eyes again, and let his head loll to the side. I had stopped breathing, and found myself needing air. I drew in a breath, and got startled when his eyes flashed open again. I froze as his bronze eyes turned black. Why were his eyes changing color?

His now black eyes roved over my body, stopping when they landed on my face. "What…" he started to cough up blood. I knelt forward quickly, and slipped a hand under his back. He kept his eyes on me as I, as gently as I could, helped him to sit up slightly. I knew he couldn't do it himself. It looked like too many bones were broken for that. I didn't have much medical experience, but I did know that his coughing up blood – pink blood? – meant he had internal bleeding. After a few moments, he seemed to calm down a bit, and, eventually, he did stop coughing.

He attempted talking again. "Wha…what…planet…?" And the blood came again. When he stopped shaking and coughing, I spoke, for the first time.

"What planet are you on?" Looking relieved, he nodded. "Earth." He looked puzzled for a moment. Then understanding dawned across his pain-filled features.

"Hal… J-Jordan. Two Eight...One Four." He managed. I felt my eyebrows furrow. Hal Jordan must be that Green Lantern on the news. 2814? What did that stand for? No matter, he needed help.

"You…you need medical attention. Badly." I said as I looked at the blood. But, already, his breaths were starting to grow shallower and shorter. "Quickly." I started fishing around for my cell phone in my pocket.

"No time." He looked tired. No. No, no, no. "Too late." I watched as his one good hand reached over to his right. He grabbed onto a green ring, and pulled it off. Slowly, the green suit melted away, leaving him in black pants. His chest was as bad as the rest of him. Worse, even.

"Hey, hey. Calm down." But he already looked calm. Too calm. "Don't die on me. That's a horrible first impression." He let out a soft chuckle, and pressed the green ring into my hand.

"I do hope…" He coughed. "…you're right for the ring. Place it on your finger. It will…take…you…to…Oa…and…" I gripped his hand.

His eyelids started to droop. "No! Keep your eyes open! Do not die on me!" But it was too late. He was already gone. His eyes had dulled. His chest ceased to rise and fall. I sat there, for what seemed like hours, as his skin grew colder and colder. It was probably only minutes, really. Thunder crackled. With a small hesitation, I drew my hand across his face, and closed his eyes, which would never startle me by changing color again.

I leaned back onto the balls of my feet. He was dead. There was nothing I could do, now. I had never seen someone die before. Before this moment, I had never seen the light drain from them, slackening their limbs and features. Eyes were just eyes. Devices used for vision, and came in all sorts of different colors. I had read books that also described them as windows to the soul. I had never really believed that. They were just eyes. Just another part of the body. I couldn't doubt it, though. Not now. Not when I had just seen the light, life, and possibility drain out of the eyes before me.

I turned away from him, and lowered myself until I was sitting. As I gazed out at the rain and lightening, as I listened to the booming thunder, I got lost in thought.

What to do, what choices were laid before me? Two choices. The first one was…simple. Very simple. I could set this strange ring down on the ground, or the steps I currently sat on. I could get up; brush myself off of this experience. I could start back through that unkempt lawn of grass, and start running back home through the rain. I could run back to civilization. I could walk through the doors of my apartment building, and greet the security guard, Mr. Wells. I could take the elevator up to my room, and forget all about this. I could forget this ring, this person, this death.

The second one was…well…not so simple. I could accept this. I could accept the unknown. I could take this green ring, and slide it onto my finger. But what would happen after that? What was a Green Lantern? Where was this...Oa? What did the numbers 2814 mean? What, or who, was Paralax? Did I really want to know? Enough to justify taking the chance, and hand myself over blindly to the unknown?

I thought for a long time. I don't know how long, but it was a while. It stormed on and on. The sun hadn't risen yet. The houses all around me were vacant and vandalized. I thought. And thought. And thought.

I stood up, and looked around me. At the grass. At the very few trees. At the houses. At the alien. At the ring. I looked up at the sky somewhat hesitantly, and instantly got doused with water. Without looking down, I slipped the ring onto my right, middle finger. My decision was made.

Author's Note:Sorry guys! I totally didn't mean to take that long to update. My computer has been on the fritz, I had a lot of stuff to do, and, well, I didn't have much inspiration. And, as much as I wish I could, I can't write without my muse. Hopefully the next chapter won't take as long as this one! Lita