Chapter 9: Dark

"You do anything to hurt her you won't even make it to the ground" – John Stewart.

She cracked her eyes open. Her body felt sore and numb, dizziness settling in. She finally manage to focus, only to realize her wings were bound together, hands and legs tied in a tight knot. She took in her surroundings. She was in a bedroom, the walls were cracked and beautiful faded tiles aligned the floors.

"Don't panic… don't panic…"

She closed her eyes trying to remember what had happened.

There was Mari… John… and…. And….

Her eyes shot open as she remembers that face who took her, and fear took over her at once. It couldn't be him, could it?

There was a small knife next to her. Maybe, maybe if she could just reach it….

Her thought stopped just in time to see the wooden door swing open as he walked into the room. The sight of him could have made her scream.

"Awake already?" he whispered, looking at her with blood-shot eyes.

She looked at him with a mixture of hatred and anger and unexpected surprise. She recognizes that voice, the way he walks the scar of his face that traveled from his temple to the side of his jaw. She recognize those coal black eyes of his, only this time they were darker shades than before. The only thing missing were his wings.

"What do you want? Let me go now!" she screamed at him.

"Let you go? But you've just got here…" he moved closer to her now, allowing himself to sit on the bed and stroke her cheeks. His black ring cold against her face. His red eyes searching her green orbs as he leaned down and press kisses on her neck. Taking in her lively scent.

" Let me go…." Shayera begged voice not above a whisper. Hro stopped, and awarded her with a hard slap to the face. Before she even had time to recuperate, she felt cold hands strangling the life out of her. She grasp, choking for air while clawing helplessly against his hands.

"You will listen to me, and only me!" he hissed in her face, forcing her to look at him.

"You belong to me and only me! Understand that?" She didn't say anything and only kept her eyes close tightly, she didn't want to see what he had become, what he had become because of what she did. She felt the weight of his stare, as his brush a lock of red hair away from her face.

"I thought you were dead" she stated out.

He looked away. "So you heard. Curious why I'm still in this very room with you?"

He stood up and walked towards the window, his arms tucked behind him.

"I assume you had heard the way I died. How because of you, Thanagar wage a losing battle to the Gordanians. I watched as they tear apart ship by ship, every living soul aboard exploded with those lasers blasted towards them." He paused, and she could see his hands clenched into tight fists as he relieved those dark memories that were so deeply imprinted in his mind.

"I died that day when I drove the head ship into that cursed Gordanian flagship. But it was too late, the war was lost. Everything was gone, every soul was gone. "

Hro suddenly turned around to face her, his eyes are now as red as crimson blood so fierce that they could pierce right through her soul.

"Did you know what my final thoughts were Shayera Hol? I thought about you, before the flames engulf me and brought me to hell, all the things you had done, what could have been prevented, what we could have had if you had been loyal!" He yelled at her accusingly now.

Shayera would not keep quiet," And let you destroy all the innocent lives on Earth? The price is just too much Hro! "

He was in vain now, he breathed in heavy breaths through clenched teeth.

"You saved that forsaken planet because of that mere human! You wretched whore, I gave you all I had and you tore it all into pieces. I lost you, my reputation, Thanagar and my own soul!" He lunged towards her, wanting to tear apart her very being for thinking herself as a righteous woman.

Unbeknownst to him, she had hidden the knife she saw earlier and when he jumped, she stabbed it right into his chest.

She watched in relief as he slumped beneath her and breathes a sigh of relief.

But it was short lived when a soft laugh immerge, chuckling. Then it grew into a menacing laugh as Hro rise above her, bathing in black aura, the knife still deeply in tacked in his chest. He looks at her smiling the same sinister smile.

"Don't you get it darling? It seems your foolishness still lives till today. I'm already dead darling, and only an object of purity, hope and love could kill me."

He closes in on her, the same cold hands with that black ring of his edging closer.

"Now traitor you will pay deeply for your sins. Not even the green lantern can stand against me this time …"

Disclaimer: I do not own the black lantern corps. I'm just borrowing the idea of them representing death and the concept of their rings.

Author's notes: I don't really know much about the Black Lanterns save the facts that they represent death, their leader is Black Hand and they are enemies of life. So my idea and the ongoing story of the Black lanterns might be vastly different from those in the comics. But then I suppose this is Fan fiction so, no judge. I assure you it would be used somewhere in some stories that are still in my head.