Chapter Summaries

Bruce investigated a devastating impact in western Kansas and suspected it was connected to something from space, while John restrained the injured Sinestro and prepared to question him. The chapter ended as John announced he had two questions for Sinestro.

• Bruce scanned the steaming crater in western Kansas and found signs of an unknown battle, including a strange biological trace and no remains.
• Bruce asked Alfred to search Kansas for a possible barn, electromagnetic anomalies, damage reports, and unregistered people.
• Sinestro woke in John's basement with his wrists tied and discovered that John had taken his Green Ring.
• Sinestro failed to overcome the Sling Ring's cyan energy and accepted that John had captured him for information.
• John crouched beside Sinestro and told him he had two questions.

John questioned Sinestro about the emotional spectra, the Green Lantern Corps, and whether the Guardians could reclaim his ring, then released Sinestro and ordered him off Earth. Sinestro suspected Kryptonians were coming after John, who confirmed that he was the target.

• John learned that green will and yellow fear normally repel each other and cause mental breakdowns, while his will had fused and controlled both spectra.
• John returned Sinestro's ring, but it remained powerless until John later restored its function.
• Sinestro told John that the Corps had thirty-six hundred members and that the Guardians of Oa could potentially recall Lantern Rings.
• John ordered Sinestro to leave Earth and claimed his attack had been self-defense, warning that more enemies were coming for him.
• Sinestro guessed that Kryptonians were coming, and John confirmed that he was the one they were after.

John thanked Old Joe for his help before they went to repair the farm’s irrigation pump, while Bruce investigated the disappearance of satellite data over Kansas and prepared to monitor the area. Zod learned that the Black Zero would reach Earth’s low orbit in ten days and focused on the planet carrying Krypton’s Codex of Life.

• John told Old Joe that Sinestro had left before dawn, then thanked him for his help the previous night.
• Old Joe told John that the western irrigation canal’s pump bearing had seized, and they agreed to replace its bronze bushings after breakfast.
• Bruce archived the Kansas anomaly as K-002 after discovering that satellite tracking and imagery had failed over the farming area.
• Bruce activated an anomalous-energy threshold trigger for Kansas and prepared weapons, saying he had to keep humanity’s fate in human hands.
• Faora reported that the Black Zero would reach Earth’s low orbit in ten Earth days.
• Zod looked toward Earth and noted that the Codex of Life was on the planet.

Zod reflected on Krypton’s plan to transform Earth into a new homeworld before an unknown dark-yellow entity infiltrated his warship. The entity reached the bridge and filled the Kryptonian warriors’ minds with visions of the Phantom Zone.

• Zod considered how the World Engine would reshape Earth in ten days to support Kryptonian civilization.
• Faora reported that an unknown massless energy signal had penetrated the warship and was moving through its cooling pipes.
• The signal disabled sections of the ship and advanced toward the bridge as Zod turned to face it.
• Faora and the guards armed themselves and formed a defensive wall in front of Zod.
• The dark-yellow entity gathered on the bridge and stirred the warriors’ deepest fears with visions of the Phantom Zone.

Zod rallied his soldiers after an unknown entity forced them to relive the horrors of Krypton’s destruction and their past suffering. He approached the entity, but it struck him and began invading his body and mind with the deaths of Krypton and its people.

• A memory of a decompression accident in the Phantom Zone showed Zod’s adjutant dying in the vacuum while Zod watched helplessly from an isolation chamber.
• The soldiers saw Krypton shattered and nearly lost their composure, but Zod ordered them to stand firm and vowed to find a new world for their people.
• Zod swept his blade and dispelled the visions before stepping forward to confront the hovering yellow mass.
• The mass, identified as Spectrum, sensed Zod’s fear and determination, then transformed into a spike and pierced his chest through his family crest.
• Spectrum invaded Zod’s body and mind, flooding him with the dying cries of Krypton and the deaths of its ten billion people.

Zod endured a terrifying mental assault that forced him to confront Krypton’s destruction and stoked his rage against Jor-El and the infant carrying the Codex. He awoke aboard the Black Zero after four stellar hours unconscious, and Faora reported that medical scans had found nothing wrong.

• A foreign consciousness flooded Zod’s mind with fear and visions of Krypton’s dead, urging him to sacrifice Earth’s people, but he resisted until he collapsed.
• While unconscious, Zod raged against Jor-El and vowed to take the Codex from Jor-El’s child as a dusky yellow presence coiled around his spine.
• Zod awoke restrained in the Black Zero’s medical bay, and Faora released him when he ordered her to.
• Faora told Zod that he had been unconscious for four stellar hours and that the ship had gone to level-one alert.
• Faora reported that the neural, circulation, and genetic scans were all negative, though she seemed to notice a fleeting yellow flash in Zod’s eyes.

Zod concealed his unexplained fainting spell and learned the Black Zero would reach Earth in fewer than five days. Meanwhile, Sinestro failed to contact Oa through ordinary channels, established a primitive quantum connection, and began examining John's ring from their battle.

• Faora reported that Zod showed no radiation or infection, and the central computer attributed his fainting to excitement.
• Zod dismissed Faora's concerns, asked about the ship's course, and learned it had locked onto Sol-3 with fewer than five days remaining.
• Zod watched the yellow star ahead and vowed that he was coming for Kal-El.
• Sinestro tried to contact Oa and its emergency beacon, but the ring reported failures caused by an unknown spectral distortion.
• Sinestro used an old quantum communication method to reach nearby nodes, then recreated his battle with John in a force field.
• Sinestro slowed and magnified the simulation to inspect the pale cyan ring on John's raised hand.

Sinestro analyzed John Kent’s overwhelming will and fear-based power, then sent Oa a warning and proposed developing yellow-powered weapons. Oa summoned him through a teleportation gate, where he arrived before the grave Supreme Guardians Council.

• Sinestro reviewed the simulation of John Kent defeating him and concluded that John could wield fear through his will.
• Sinestro recalled how he had used terror to end a workers’ strike and maintain order on Korugar.
• Sinestro sent Oa a report confirming Abin Sur’s death, John Kent’s unusual power and independent ring, and the need to classify him as a corps-level risk.
• Sinestro appended a proposal for the Guardians to develop implements powered by yellow fear and sent the beacon to Oa.
• After seven planetary rotations, Oa opened a teleportation gate, and Sinestro stepped through to the Supreme Council Hall.
• Sinestro found the twelve emotionless Guardians gathered in an unexpectedly grave atmosphere.

The Guardians examined Sinestro’s reconstruction of John’s battle and discovered that green will and yellow fear had formed a stable, blue-tinged spectrum. They debated whether the dangerous mutation could help the Green Lantern Corps before Sinestro arrived at Oa to answer for his request to use fear.

• The Guardians reviewed Sinestro’s battle reconstruction and saw that the Emotional Spectrum had mutated, with its core shifting toward blue.
• Kallon rejected the green-yellow fusion as a violation of Oa’s laws, while Korugar explained how will had forced fear into a stable equilibrium.
• The Guardians debated Sinestro’s proposal to use fear, weighing the danger against the Corps’ limited resources and inability to protect every sector.
• Kallon recognized that the blue spectrum was stabilizing the fusion and learned that Oa’s outer defenses had been breached.
• Sinestro entered the council hall, holding his chest.

Sinestro argued that the Green Lantern Corps should harness the yellow spectrum of fear, and the Guardians tasked him with obtaining a stable energy sample from the Kryptonian orphan on Earth. As Sinestro departed Oa, he sensed corruption in the Corps’ green light.

• Sinestro defended using fear as a tool of order and proposed creating a ring powered by the yellow spectrum.
• Kallon explained that Oa needed a stable sample of yellow-spectrum energy, which was known to exist in the Kryptonian orphan.
• Korugar revealed that Zod’s warship would reach Earth within a week and ordered Sinestro to offer the orphan Oa’s protection in exchange for an energy sample.
• Kallon told Sinestro that if the orphan refused and Zod killed him, Oa would recover the sample from his remains.
• Sinestro left Oa with one week to complete his task and sensed rot in the light of his ring.

Four days before the invasion, Zod’s ship entered the Solar System, and Parallax’s energy intensified his hatred as he ordered a probe to Earth. After detecting an alien craft approaching, Bruce launched his fighter from the Batcave to investigate.

• The Black Zero entered the Solar System’s gravitational disk with four days remaining in the countdown.
• Parallax’s energy entered Zod and magnified his hatred, while Faora received orders to test Earth’s defenses and search for the Codex of Life and the House of El’s surviving heir.
• A probe launched from the Black Zero toward Earth.
• Bruce detected a gravitational anomaly in the Atlantic and a fast-moving object entering Earth’s atmosphere.
• Bruce dismissed Alfred’s warning that the military had already raised its alert and launched his fighter from the Batcave toward the ocean.

John detected a Kryptonian spacecraft in the Atlantic and learned that other Lantern Ring bearers, including Sinestro, had arrived on Earth. As John headed toward the ship, Bruce attacked it with the Batwing, but the spacecraft repelled his missiles and aimed its cannons at him.

• John used [Insight] to trace seismic disturbances to a Kryptonian spacecraft deep in the Atlantic.
• John's ring resonated, alerting him that other Lantern Ring bearers had arrived, and he realized Sinestro had betrayed him.
• John left the barn and flew toward the Atlantic, declaring that Earth was his.
• Bruce fired magnetic-flux pulse rounds from the Batwing at the hovering scout ship, but its force field destroyed them.
• The scout ship opened four heavy cannons and locked their energy weapons onto Bruce's fighter.

Bruce narrowly escaped the plasma attack as John destroyed the reconnaissance ship, but the vessel launched a beacon toward space before sinking. John knew Zod’s arrival could no longer be prevented, and the chapter ended with Bruce meeting John’s gaze from his damaged fighter.

• Bruce attempted to evade the plasma streams, but their heat scorched his cockpit and overloaded its systems.
• John descended through the clouds and struck the reconnaissance ship with two red beams, splitting it apart and detonating its engines.
• The blast wave drove Bruce’s fighter toward the sea, but he used the ground effect to level the aircraft just above the waves.
• The sinking ship ejected a pod that launched a golden spike and transmission beam into space, confirming the Codex of Life’s resonance and an active spark carrier.
• John chose not to destroy the beacon, knowing Zod’s arrival could no longer be prevented, while Bruce hovered nearby and met his eyes.

John left Bruce after demonstrating his overwhelming power, then headed into space toward the Black Zero. After identifying John as the bearer of the Codex of Life, Zod ordered his forces to prepare for an invasion of Earth in three days.

• Bruce secretly recorded John’s spectral and energy data, then waited for Alf to rescue him.
• John departed through the sky at immense speed, leaving a vast depression in the ocean behind him.
• The Black Zero’s projection revealed John’s Kryptonian genetic structure and the Codex of Life fused into his cells.
• Zod’s violent desire triggered a strange yellow force within him, changing his eyes and unsettling Faora.
• Zod ordered the World Engine and main cannons prepared, declaring that the Black Zero would enter Earth’s atmosphere after three rotational cycles.

Sinestro returned to Earth and received Oa’s order to recover John, the Kryptonian who had fused willpower and primal fear, before Zod’s fleet arrived. On the Kansas farm, John told Old Joe he might have to leave for about five days.

• Sinestro concealed himself in orbit and learned that Zod’s mothership, Black Zero, would arrive in three Earth rotations.
• Oa ordered Sinestro to recover John intact at any cost, and Sinestro resented being told to treat him as a specimen.
• In Kansas, John joined Old Joe to repair the old tractor.
• John told Old Joe that he might need to travel somewhere far away for about five days.

Bruce Wayne survived the destruction of his craft and examined the recovered footage of the Atlantic encounter, identifying John as the source of the beams that cut apart the warship. The footage showed John looking directly through the fighter’s armor at Bruce.

• Bruce emerged from his wrecked craft with severe burns and tore away skin fused to his suit.
• Alfred urged Bruce to get medical treatment, but Bruce installed the craft’s black box in the Batcave’s main computer.
• Bruce analyzed the footage and saw two red beams slice through the unidentified warship, whose energy readings exceeded the analyzer’s range.
• Bruce told Alfred that John was neither the military nor something from Hell and concluded that his attack involved an unknown particle-light stream.
• Bruce showed that John’s gaze had passed through the fighter’s thick windshield and landed on Bruce in the pilot’s seat.

Bruce analyzed John’s extraordinary senses, classified him as an unknown threat, and began preparing weapons against powerful beings from deep space. In Chicago, David Miller’s family dinner was interrupted when energy from a newborn wormhole swept across the Solar System and froze his face mid-expression.

• Bruce concluded that John could see and hear through barriers and harsh conditions, and Alfred suggested that John might not be an enemy.
• Bruce created a threat file for Super-Man and warned Alfred that humanity had no conventional means to retaliate against him.
• Bruce ordered preparations from the Arctic laboratory and began modifying military equipment to build weapons capable of fighting powerful beings.
• In Chicago, David Miller grilled dinner and shared a warm moment with his wife, Sarah, and their daughter, Emily.
• As energy from a newborn wormhole in the Kuiper Belt swept across the Solar System, David’s face froze while he was chewing steak.

Manhunters across Earth awakened when a deep-space gravitational distortion triggered their protocols. At a Washington gala, Diana reflected on her decision to let humanity shape its own future before leaving the washroom and returning to the gathering.

• David's hidden retinal membrane opened, and his eyes detected a suspected military-grade gravitational field generator near the edge of the Solar System.
• Manhunters in London, Tokyo, and Vatican City awakened as their Earth Dormancy Protocols were overridden.
• Diana attended a Washington gala at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History while questioning her choice to remain a quiet observer of humanity.
• Diana used the private washroom, composed herself, and stepped out toward the washbasin.

Diana sensed an extraterrestrial war approaching and decided to abandon her rule of staying hidden, while Zod’s fear of Krypton’s extinction drove him to punish Val-Zod for questioning his plan. The chapter left Diana preparing to reveal her power and Zod’s forces poised to carry out a dangerous invasion of Earth.

• Diana sensed a war coming from beyond Earth and realized Ares would soon awaken.
• Diana weighed the danger of revealing herself against the destruction an extraterrestrial attack could bring, then accepted that she had to act.
• On the mothership Black Zero, Zod stood over the wounded Val-Zod, who had challenged his plan to deploy the World Engine without more reconnaissance.
• Three minutes earlier, Val-Zod had warned Zod that an unknown enemy could destroy the World Engine and Krypton’s remaining Codex and embryos during its descent.
• Zod had cut off Val-Zod’s arm before he could finish speaking, while Faora watched tensely.

Zod punished Val-Zod for questioning his plan to use the World Engine to remake Earth as Krypton, then rallied the Kryptonian soldiers to fight for their civilization. As the crew pledged themselves to the mission, Faora suspected Zod had lost his reason and touched the blade at her back.

• Zod seized Val-Zod and declared that he would drive the World Engine into the planet despite Val-Zod's objections.
• Zod threw a severed arm into the decompression chamber to show the soldiers the lethal cold outside the ship, and Val-Zod passed out.
• Zod ordered Val-Zod placed in the regeneration tank and addressed the crew, condemning the Council of Elders and urging them to fight for Krypton.
• Zod displayed the blue planet on the star chart and promised the soldiers they would witness Krypton's rebirth there.
• The soldiers cried out for Krypton, while Faora noticed signs of Zod's worsening condition and touched the short blade at her back.