Ring Quest part 4

On the Black Mercy Planet, Mother Mercy erupts in pain as her “children” have been killed by the Green Lantern Corps. Kyle Rayner says they need to make contact with it but Soranik Natu reveals that Mother Mercy is acting out in rage and pain. Isamot Kol says: “If it’s reading my mind, it’s not going to like what it sees.” As the Green Lanterns continue to struggle, the skies of the planet start to grow dark and soon the gravity in their area starts to increase so much, the Green Lanterns can’t stay afloat. They soon hit the ground hard and look into the sky and see all the dead bodies that were in orbit of the planet are crashing down towards them. Isamot realizes that Mother Mercy is trying to feed and draw both the bodies and them into her. Mother Mercy then speaks: “You dare invade my world and seek to incinerate my children.” Vath Sarn and Iolande try to move out of the way but they are stuck to the ground. Vath creates a bomb shelter construct to shield them from the debry but it still hits them hard. Stel tells them that the increased gravity will soon take out their shields and they will be drawn in, with no way of escaping. However, the injured Sodam Yat tells Natu to throw him in.

On another side of the planet, Mongul and Duel notice that Mother Mercy is feeding a bit too early but usually the gravity pull is planet wide. Back at Mother Mercy, Natu tells Guy Gardner that Yat wants to be thrown into Mother Mercy, which Guy agrees is probably not a bad plan. Kyle tells Stel to help Natu with Sodam and soon Stel creates a rocket propulsion system to launch Yat into Mother Mercy. Natu straps him on and Stel finds the center point and launches Sodam into the center of Mother Mercy. Inside, Sodam Yat unleashes his Ion power and blows Mother Mercy from the inside and knocks himself out of her as a result but still has a Black Mercy attached to him. Mother Mercy starts retracting in pain and Vath, Isamot and Iolande jet forward to finish her off, Despite the fact that Kyle keeps telling them not too. Soranik Natu soon creates an isolation sphere around Mother Mercy, causing her three fellow lanterns to bounce off it and onto the ground. Natu tells them to: “Cease and Desist. This creature is grieving.” Vath and Isamot tells Natu to step aside but Guy Gardner tells them that he thinks Mother Mercy wants to talk to them but approaches Yat. Kyle appears with the injured Arisia in his hands and tells Natu to release the force friends around the two. Mother Mercy then reaches out and the Black Mercies around both Yat and Arisia come off. Natu sees if the two are all right but Arisia yells wanting to kill Mother Mercy. She goes no to explain that it made her worse fears come true. Mother Mercy tells them they weren’t meant to do this. Arisia still upset lights up her ring but Sodam Yat comes to her side and tells her not to. He then tells of his friend, who was an alien that was hated and killed because he was from another world. He tells her that Mother Mercy is the same way and despite the fact that Arisia lived her worse fears, she will be stronger because of it.

Back on Oa, at the Guardians Citadel, the Guardians of the Universe see that the Star Sapphire Corps is starting rise. They have picked up another violet energy signature in Sector 1416 on Zamaron. It’s proof that the violet surge was not an aberration. The scared Guardians tells them that the power will not stay confined to one sector. It spreads and if they don’t act soon, the War of Light will burn away all they know. Back on Mother Mercy’s planet, Guy Gardner has all the Green Lanterns assembled and Kyle then asks Mother Mercy what is truly going on. She tells her story: “Since time immemorial there has been a ‘Mother Mercy’ here on this planet.” She goes on to tell her story of what the Black Mercies truly are and what she is. She was the first birther of mercy. She is the very planet, she lives inside the center of it and hundreds of years ago, a lone space traveler crashed down on the planet. Injured and dying in great pain. She launched onto the survivor and stimulated his thought process and made him live out his wildest dreams as he slowly died. After he passed and he was ingested by the planet. She felt there was great pain in the galaxy and she had to relieve it. Hence, the Black Mercy was born. She seeded the surface with her “children” and when they reached maturity she would send her children to the stars to relieve pain on hundreds of worlds to people who needed it. However, there was one problem with such a family and that was feeding them. She soon learned how too but tapping into the planet’s gravity field and bringing down deceased beings so the planets could feed off them. She also used the ability to call down ships and other beings to take her children off world but one day, she brought the wrong kind, the original Mongul. Not wanting to show her existence, she let Mongul take several of her children off the planet, where he went on to use them against his enemies. Things took a turn for the worse years later, when his son came to the planet and redesigned the Black Mercy with his Sinestro Corps power rings and made Black Mercy bring people’s worse fears alive and launched them across the various sectors but didn’t know where. Her children were never meant for this, Guy Gardner soon lights up his ring telling his fellow corps members that hey need to fan out and collect all the Black Mercies and return them to the planet. However, he is soon fired upon by Mongul and Duel and attaches Black Mercies on all of them. Mongul smiles and says: “I see we have visitors.”

What a great issue, finally we learn the truth behind the Black Mercy after all these years. I remember first reading about them back in the day during Alan Moore’s run on Superman. I thought they were a great idea and over the last few years, Black Mercy has shown up in various books. Having the current Mongul recreate a plant that was meant to relieve pain into something that delivers pain and sorrow is a great idea. What better way to spread fear across the universe by having something tap into your worse fears and making them real. Mother Mercy’s story is a sad one but you understand both her mission and her pain. She just wanted to bring peace in her own form but others manipulated her over all goal. She is more the victim then the oppressor. I’ll also leave it up to Tomasi and Gleason, they never back down during this entire story. Even the nods to the rising Star Sapphire Corps and the War of Light is starting to take shape in this book besides the main title. However, you know there is more going on with the scared guardian, since the Black Lantern Corps symbol keeps showing up in her eyes. A great book and I can’t wait to see how Ring Quest ends next month.