Chapter Twelve: Lantern and Shadow
John Stewart didn't believe in wasting time.
"You survived your first skirmish," he said the morning after. "That's good. But luck won't save you twice. Let's see what else you've got."
They started in the old orchard behind Nelson's home. Snow was still packed on the branches, but Kane's body didn't seem to register the cold anymore.
"Show me what you know," John said.
Kane obeyed.
He summoned constructs—golden threads of thought turned into hard form. Shields, blades, runes that hovered mid-air like floating scripture. But it wasn't just constructs. Kane could bend space in small ways. Warp light. Hear energy before it struck.
John watched silently, arms folded, eyes sharp.
When Kane was done, breath light but steady, John finally spoke.
"You're not raw power. You're refined—like someone taught you pieces of a dozen systems. Magic. Quantum displacement. Lantern-grade construct projection. But you don't know the framework."
"Which framework?" Kane asked.
John gave a faint smirk. "All of them."
---
So they started over.
Discipline. Control. The language of energy, not just its use.
John didn't just teach him how to fight—he taught him how to choose when not to. Where to place will. How to anchor thought. When to bend, and when to strike.
"You're too used to reacting," John said. "Power doesn't make you untouchable. It makes you a target. You act without clarity, you become what they fear."
It wasn't easy.
Sometimes Kane's instincts surged—power flaring in gold arcs, reflexes warping reality with a thought. But John forced him to slow down. Center. Rebuild.
"You're a symbol whether you want to be or not," he said. "Get used to it."
---
Still, training couldn't suppress the presence Kane felt watching him.
It was quiet. Distant. But constant.
The Empty Hand.
Kane saw it in his dreams again—an outline of something massive, cloaked in entropy, fingers brushing across universes like dust on a shelf.
He felt its gaze, not like heat or fear, but hunger.
Not to kill.
To consume. To hollow out.
To wear him.
---
He told John.
John didn't flinch.
"He's been quiet since Multiverse-2 collapsed. We thought he'd retreated."
"He didn't," Kane said. "He's just waiting. Watching. He felt my power the same way Sinestro did. But more… possessive."
"You're a tool," John muttered. "One he didn't forge. That bothers entities like him."
"What does he want?"
"To end story," John said simply. "And you? You're too much story wrapped in too much power. That's noise to a being of silence."
---
Two days later, Nelson made a call.
He'd seen enough signs.
The warping mirrors. The flickers in Kane's aura. The dreams that bled into waking hours. Sinestro was just the first probe. The next wave would come without restraint.
So he called Zatanna.
And she brought Raven.
They arrived the same evening.
Zatanna descended in a shimmer of silver glyphs, coat swaying, eyes sharp and assessing. "He's already bleeding into higher realms," she said immediately. "You waited too long."
"Couldn't risk him being found too soon," Nelson replied.
Raven stepped through a shadow gate behind her, hood drawn, aura wrapped tight. Her voice was quiet, but clear.
"I've felt something clawing at the walls of the multiverse. It wants in. And he's the latch."
Kane blinked. "Nice to meet you too."
Raven tilted her head. "You're glowing."
Zatanna smirked. "And radiating enough raw mystical signal to short-circuit half the wards in London."
John folded his arms. "That's why you're both here."
"We'll help him contain it," Zatanna said. "If he lets us."
"I don't want to be contained," Kane said, frustrated. "I want to understand this. Use it right."
"You will," Raven said, stepping closer. "But first, you learn control. Because if the Empty Hand can see you, so can others. Chaos. Order. The Forge. The Hells. And worse."
"Constantine's on his way," Zatanna added. "Late, of course. Said something about a minor apocalypse in Belgium."
"Sounds like him," Nelson muttered.
---
That night, Kane sat by the fireplace, alone.
He looked at his hand. It shimmered with golden light. Not just light—potential. Every time he focused, he could see more. Threads of fate. Faces he hadn't met. Battles that hadn't happened. Realities he didn't belong to.
And at the center of it, always watching, always hungering—The Empty Hand.
"I'm not your tool," he whispered.
But he wasn't sure the thing even cared.
---