Carol's house, which was more like a mansion in Hal's opinion, was a short flight away from Metropolis for someone with a Green Lantern power ring. Hal landed on the front porch with Carol in his arms, then carefully set her down.

She nervously fiddled with the ion-construct blanket that hugged her body. "This thing is really warm." Carol said, trying to get past the fact that there technically wasn't anything physical covering her, just charged particles of energy.

"Perks of having a blanket made out of charged ion particles." Hal quipped as he recalled the exact shape of Carol's house key, created a facsimile, and plunged it into the keyhole. He pressed the door forward and held it open for Carol, who shuffled inside as quickly as she could.

Hal shut the door behind him and heard Carol call from a different room "Okay, you can...uh...get rid of the blanket now!"

With that, Hal stopped focusing on the blanket he had constructed to protect Carol's dignity. He strode into the living room, glancing around as he did. The place was just the way it was the last time Hal was there. However, there was one thing he noticed. There was a photo frame sitting on the mantle that had been tipped face down.

He didn't bother to check the photo. "Listen, I'm gonna send Tom a text. Let him know what happened so he can come over here and keep an eye on you." Hal hollered to Carol, who was sifting through one of her wardrobes to find something to put on.

"N-No, that's alright. I'll call him myself...later." Carol replied.

Before long, she entered the living room as she tightened the strap of her bathrobe and tied it into a knot. "Thanks...Hal. You should get going."

Jordan sighed as he approached Carol. "Hey. I'm sorry about snapping at you earlier."

"It's okay. Did I...know who died?" The human woman asked.

"It was Tomar-Re. The...bird-looking guy."

Carol glanced at the ground. "...Hal... You lost your first friend in the Corps...and I was too preoccupied to even ask who it was. This was what we struggled with...wasn't it? We were never on the same wavelength. We never really...understood the different worlds we came from. I never really grasped the fact that you were out there risking your life to protect everyone."

Hal nervously scratched the back of his neck. "Yeah. And all this Earth stuff...it's going to sound terrible...but it all didn't seem to matter as much once I saw the bigger picture. I mean...Tom would be able to get all this, be around for it all...right?"

"Y-Yes. And Vell...she was there for you when it happened?"

"We were there for each other. We caught the guy who did it, together."

Carol cocked her head with a smile. "I'm happy for you, Hal. You deserve to have a clear mind."

"So do you."

"Thank you for bringing me back. I...I still feel like you should've followed Vell."

"Like I told you before, we're GLs. Our duty is to protect the people; in that situation, that meant you. Because she's who she is...a Green Lantern...I don't have to worry about her as much as I worried about you. When intergalactic aliens came after you...well...it scared me. I'm not as scared anymore."

Carol nodded. "And the less scared you are...the better."

"You really do get me, you know."

"Right now, I do. And that's the problem. We only knew each other sometimes." Carol's eyes filled with tears. "I'm sorry, having the Sapphire in me again really messed me up. Got a headache the size of the moon plus I'm a nervous wreck..."

"Are you okay? The Sapphire said something about...some unbridled emotions allowing her to take the spotlight."

"...It's...it's nothing."

"Carol. Tell me." Hal urged.

"After we spoke at your place...I don't know. Everything we said to each other, it made me remember our time together. It made me regret ending it, just for a second. Maybe she used that as a catalyst."

"I'm sorry you got dragged into this again. I'll make sure it's the last time."

She grabbed Hal's hand just as he went to move for the front door. "I don't know what's come over me. Can I-I...have a kiss? Just one. The last one."

Hal wasn't the type of guy to shirk on something like that. Besides, he knew at this point what Vell would approve of and disapprove of. She would ask him if he wanted to do it. If he said yes, she would force him to follow it honestly. To Vell, supressing emotion was stupid. To hide it like so many others did could possibly make it harder for him to move on from Carol.

He leant in and pecked Carol on the lips. She smiled at him and said "Now go get her. Bring her home."

—————————————-

Hal had a plan. It wasn't exactly a doozy...but it was better than what he had ten minutes ago. Finding Vell was fairly easy due to Vell activating low power mode on her ring, pinpoint accurate positional data wasn't available, only a rough estimate sphere about 50,000 miles in diameter. It told Hal that she was still moving, and he was within the bubble. Catching up was the hard part. She was going so fast for so long that she was about to break through the frontier of Guardian space and head into uncharted territory. The GL Pioneer division was dedicated to exploring outward from Oa, gradually documenting every galaxy they came into contact with. The rate Vell was going at meant that she'd overshoot the outmost Pioneers in just a few cycles.

Of course, she turned off her communications to conserve power. She wanted her fuel to last as long as it could. Hal had no idea how close the Sapphire was to her, either... All he could do was push his ring as hard as he could and hope that he could catch up with her before she was taken by the Sapphire.

However, a low, seductive voice ended that wishful thinking. "Oh it feels so good to have you chase me for a change."

Hal snarled. The voice was being beamed to him from a localpoint of origin. He ran scans, but local cosmic dust and background radiation in this neck of the woods was extremely thick...too dense even for his ring's systems to accurately ascertain a position.

"You're really starting to piss me off. What do you want? What's your goal here?"

"I'm going to beat you down until that ring of yours is dead, then bring you back to Zamaron. Nice bluff, telling me that my people moved on. I dropped by just then...they seemed excited to see me."

"You can't be Queen if you're under arrest for multiple kidnappings and the attempted murder of law enforcement officers."

"I'm in love with this new mate you've chosen. Her body is so powerful...so beautiful."

Hal snarled. The Sapphire already had Vell... He slowed to a halt, still conducting his background scans in the meantime. "If you like her so much, why don't you marry her?"

The Sapphire giggled like a schoolgirl. "You're funny. Really. I'm almost going to regret this."

The Green Lantern was slammed by a freight train of energy, an impact that halved his shield integrity and sent him spiralling out of control inside the particle cloud that impeded his sensors. Hal urged his spinning to stop but was tackled by a humanoid missile. This additional attack lowered his shield to 36%.

He opened his eyes to see Vell, grabbing him by the shoulders and thrusting him through space at insurmountable speed. The increased potency that the Sapphire possessed from Vell's mind was beyond anything it could've expected. "I'm going to make you mine, Hal. Mine!"

Jordan gritted his teeth and fired an ion pulse directly at Vell's face, causing her to reel backwards slightly but nothing else. He then festered a high concentration of power, focused it through his ring and fired it at Vell with no holds barred.

An ion beam erupted into the Sapphire, this time staggering her. Using the blow to his advantage, Hal pushed with all his might, and the pair veered off into the vicinity of an uninhabited planet. The velocity was so great that Hal didn't even see or feel their re-entry. The surface of this world was bright pink and covered in floating mountains, held aloft by the extreme magnetic field in effect here. Hal barely had enough time to stand before he was seized from behind.

The Sapphire wrapped her new Bekkorian arms around Hal's neck and tightened. "Finally. This one experiences emotion in such a...raw fashion. She doesn't hold them back like you humans do. I haven't felt this much resonation since my first life."

Hal struggled, but to no avail. His ring was running low...and the Sapphire, because of Vell's unfiltered mind, could thrive. Vell, under the control of the Zamaron queen, heaved Hal over her head and tossed him into the air. The human once again crashed into the surface of the strange planet, tasting blood in his mouth.

There was no more time...he had to make his move now.

"I've taken the form that loves you most. The form that you love most. Submit yourself to me, my love." The Sapphire demanded.

"You don't love anyone but yourself, Sapphire." Hal grunted. He summoned his power battery, which materialised in his left hand. "You're gonna have a lot of alone time, where you're going."

He raised the battery and pressed his ring to the back of it and twisted. This triggered the device's emergency discharge, a process that would vent all ion currently stored inside it. The resulting blast was unlike anything that this planet had seen before. It tore hills from the very ground, vaporised flora, dislodged the floating chunks of earth in the air and boiled the atmosphere.

Despite all this, the Sapphire was only pushed back as if she were fighting a heavy wind. She grunted in pain as her personal shielding crackled and popped, but she did so with a psychotic grin on her face. Hal fought the incredible recoil to keep the lantern battery steady.

Vell's form was being buffeted by the volatile waves of energy. She staggered forward, weathering the ion storm as Hal's eyes widened. Every power battery contained as much energy as that produced by the detonation of a nuclear warhead; for it to be unleashed all at once would be a devastating attack for the staunchest of foes.

After ten seconds of unbridled discharge, the surface of the planet was left smouldering black for at least a mile. The Sapphire panted in exertion as she groggily continued pacing forward. "That was a stupid idea, Hal." She said seductively.

Hal took a few steps back and raised his ring. Rays of ion lanced into his unwilling enemy, whose shielding was cracked wide open by the battery blast. She grunted as the attack slapped into her shoulder, bruising it.

"You threw away the only chance you had. The difference between us is you need to recharge and I don't." She threatened.

The human lowered his weapon. All this was doing was hurting the host, who was Vell. He grinded his teeth in frustration and snapped "I'm not going to fight you."

"Aw...but I love it when you do." The Sapphire remarked as she reeled back then hurled her clenched fist into Hal's face. The force threw him off his feet and onto the ashen ground with a vicious shockwave. Even as he laid in the dirt, he still clutched his empty battery.

His shields, like the Sapphire's, were compromised. He had the ring's passive damage dampening system to reduce the force of incoming blows, but there was no longer anything to completely cancel it out.

Sapphire giggled excitedly, glancing down and seeing that her clothing was mostly burned away; what remained were torn and scorched rags. "Mm. I like how this feels." She said, prodding at the little of her uniform that remained. "Judging from what I know of Bekkorians...so would your mate. Maybe you should get the rest off for us."

Hal snarled "You're a sick...twisted bitch...you know that...?"

The entity kept trudging forward, with that same old narcissistic half smirk on Vell's face that Hal had seen on many other women, including Carol. She was right next to Hal when she squatted by him and bit her lower lip. "I'm going to make this slow. You've wasted years of my existence...denied me for too long. I love you...but I hate you, too."

Jordan spat blood onto the ground, closing his eyes in pain. At that point, Vell's eyes snapped open in rage. "Look at me." She demanded.

Hal ignored her.

With that, she violently seized his head by the hair and tugged his gaze over to her body. "Look at me! You want this! You long for it!" She hissed, running a hand down Vell's toned abdomen. "You want me now...! I know you do! And I've beaten you...you're mine...my love."

Hal grunted as he struggled to push upward from his prone position. Amused, Sapphire allowed him to whilst still maintaining a dominant grip on his hair. He wheezed as he looked into her eyes. "I don't care about you. I never will. You goddamn monster."

He raised his battery and thrusted it onto Vell's chest and once again placed his ring into the slot on the back. When he twisted it, Hal triggered the opposite of the emergency discharge. The lantern battery hummed and whirred as it began to initiate its absorption protocol.

"The way I see it...you're nothing but energy right now, your highness." Hal started, watching as the Sapphire writhed in pain. He slapped her hand off his head, pressed to his feet, then continued "Long story short, this here is your solitary confinement."

Purple lasers fired off into the sky, and everything Hal's eyes beheld was consumed by like-coloured particles. The battery's machined growls only grew in volume and ferocity as Sapphire desperately clawed at Hal's face to no avail.

Bubbles of predator wave elements seeped through Vell's skin as she screamed. The backblow to the battery was incredible, so Hal had every muscle in his body tensed in order to fight against it. Before long, streams of the Sapphire entity were vacuumed out of Vell's body and into the seemingly hungry lantern battery.

Steadily, these plasmic strands ran their length and ended. What remained was sucked into Hal's battery, severing the connection to Vell's body. Hal fell onto his back due to the sudden release of tension. His head rammed into a rock, cutting his skin and drawing an inkling of blood. "Shit!" He yelped.

He heard a sharp gasp as Vell regained control of her body. She peeked around confoundedly with eyes wide open. She instantly spotted Hal and dove onto him. "Hal! Are you okay?!"

Hal, once he opened his eyes, saw the naked body of his girlfriend on top of him. He grinned. "I'm...I'm great now, actually."

"What happened? Are you hurt?"

"Uh...I sucked the Star Sapphire into my battery." He explained as he raised his now violet-coloured lantern.

Vell's face scrunched up. "You can do that?"

"Yeah, apparently." Hal reinforced. He dropped the lantern, exhaled heavily, then dropped his arms onto the dirt.

"This is a good look for you." He flirted with a nod.

The Bekkorian cocked her head in confusion before looking down at herself. "Oh." She shrugged, planted her hands onto her hips and smirked. "Yeah. I know."

"Real modest."

"You love it."

"True." He murmured. Hal then disengaged his uniform, revealing the casual clothes he had on underneath.

Vell gasped. "Oh. Yes. Really? Now?"

"You're starting to sound like a human."

"Shut up. Why aren't you going on about how this isn't the time?" She pressed, crossing her arms.

"I just flew halfway across the universe and got my ass handed to me to save you from a crazy stalker. I'm not waiting any longer."

Hal grabbed Vell by the neck and pulled her firmly against his body. The pair were getting calls from both the Guardians as well as Batman who wanted to check on their progress against the Star Sapphire, but it was fairly obvious that those hails wouldn't be answered for some time.

——————————

"Ya' need a new battery? Again?!" Kilowog bellowed as he crossed his arms.

Hal shrugged. "Yes. I do. Now are you gonna give me one or am I going to have to take it myself?"

"At least tell me what ya' did to it this time."

"I dispensed the ion from it then used it to absorb and trap an energy-based parasitic lifeform."

Kilowog reached over to the equipment rack inside his laboratory and snatched a power battery from it. "Yeah, yeah...that sounds about right. Never respectin' yer equipment." He then returned to Hal and slammed the battery onto the table by Hal's side. "Look, this is the latest build. Guardians just had it rolled out fer mass production. Fifty percent more efficient than yer last one, made of a lighter and denser alloy, built so any fellow officer can use it for rechargin', and of course keyed to the ID database so only personnel that ya' authorise can hold it."

Hal grasped the handle of the device and lifted it. He pursed his lips in disagreement. "Yeah...I dunno, I like my old one better."

"What? Whaddaya mean you like the old one better?" Kilowog sighed. "Jordan, this is objectively better. It stores more power, what more do ya' want from the stinkin' thing? It's a battery, not a fashion statement, ya' poozer!"

With a facetious grin, Hal synced his power ring to his newly issued power battery, then dematerialised it for storage. It vanished into green embers as a result, ready to be summoned when required. "I'm human, remember? We're not exactly a logical lot."

Before Kilowog could growl a little more at him, Hal's ring chirped in order to tell him that he had an incoming comms signal from Vell. Hal raised a palm to Kilowog, telling him to keep a lid on it, then answered the call. "Well if it isn't my favourite person in the universe."

Vell laughed. "What's going on? You busy?"

"Not really. Just getting a new battery from everyone's favourite drill sergeant slash science nerd. You?"

"Coming back from a supply run to Merdian I. Wanna get a bite to eat with me?"

"Absolutely, hot stuff."

"Meet me there, kee'lavah." Vell concluded, ending the call.

Kilowog shook his head. "Fer the love of... 'Hot stuff'?"

"Yeah. You'd bet your ass that you'd call her that if you had her." Hal said, floating towards the exit.

"Not my type, kid. Too soft. Like you stupid humans. Get outta my lab and go find yer booty call already."

The current cycle meant that most GLs in Contingent 93 were either scheduled for off-duty periods, or just finishing up on their last assignments for the day. It was night time at their base facility, something that Hal didn't get to see very often since he was never on Oa for too long. When he entered the mess hall, there was only one person inside. Vell sat at a table in the back corner of the room, watching Hal with a smile as he walked in.

She called "How'd the Guardians take to your whole sucking the Sapphire thing?"

Hal slipped himself into the chair and quipped "That's a little not safe for work, isn't it?"

"Is this another human thing? Could you just not, maybe? Because it makes us both feel like idiots."