In Brightest Day

[Niceguy]

NOTE: I first had the basic idea / plot hook for this over 20 years ago, LONG before I knew about the forum, or that anyone else shared this fetish. (Before the INTERNET, actually!) And in all that time, I've never USED it. I don't know what made me think of it, but last night SOMETHING just clicked in my head and I HAD to write this. The sneezes don't start until the second half, but hopefully someone finds it interesting anyway. Cheers!

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7:00 AM

-bzzzzt- NASA has confirmed that the giant asteroid remains on a collision course for earth, efforts by U.S and Russian astronauts have failed to...

*thump*

Carrie Nealon hit the snooze button.

"Where's Superman when you need him?" she grumbeld to herself as the sleep slowly subsided.

She quickly got dressed. No too long ago, this would have involved the athletic and somehwat tomboyish sohpmore picking out earrings and trying to decide which bracelet went best with her outfit. But today there was only piece of jewelry she would be wearing: A glowing, Green Ring .

She lowered the invisibility cloak on the latern-shaped Power Battery, held the ring against it and quietly, so her parents would not hear, recited the oath:

"In brightest day, in darkest night,

no evil shall escape my sight.

Let those who worship evil's might,

fear my power, Green Lantern's light!"

Sensing that the Ring was now fully charged, she activated it, and her jeans and tee-shirt instantly transformed to the skin-tight black body-suit, green one-piece, white gloves and green boots that were the uniform of the Green Lantern Corps. Opening the window, she gently flew outside and started to rise. In space she could travel many times the speed of light and, in the atmosphere, many times the speed of sound. But it was seven A.M. on a Saturday, and the last thing she wanted to do was attract attention to herself or her family’s home. So it would be a relatively slow, hundred miles an hours or so ascent until she was far enough away that no one would hear the sonic boom.

As she rose, she was so overcome with the trill of flight -= a novelty that had yet to wear of - that she was hardly aware of the tickle forming in her nose. She unconsciously rubbed it with a green-gloved finger before kicking it into high gear.

-BOOOOOM-

Mach-10.

'This will never get old!' she thought to herself, smiling with excitement.

At this incredible sped, it would only a couple minutes before she broke out of the atmosphere, and could then start going really fast - it would take her longer to find that rouge asteroid than it would take to get to its approximate location.

She still wasn’t anywhere near as strong as her mentor, the now retired Hal Jordan, but his Ring chose her, just as Abin Sur's had chosen him. 'How many had come before her?' she wondered. 'How many Green Lanterns had Earth been home too so far? Alan Scott... Hal Jordan... Guy Gardner... John Stewart... Kyle Rainer... and even Kilowog (who was AWESOME, she noted mentally) had made it his adopted home. And now she bore the Ring. It was an awesome responsibility but between Kilowog and Jordan, she couldn't have asked for better mentors to train her. She unconsciously rubbed her nose again, just as she broke through the outer layers of the atmosphere.

-lightspeed-

Within seconds she was as close to Mars' orbit as she was to Earth's. And as she predicted, it took her longer to FIND the asteroid than it did to get there. But she found it.

It was roughly the size of Texas.

She didn’t have time right now to worry about whether it was set on its present course on some nefarious purpose or not: She had a planet to save. With all her of will she focused the Ring's energy into a giant, green, hand and tried with all of her might to push it off course.

She was pretty sure it was pushing HER backwards instead.

She formed a giant axe and tried to smash it in two.

The reverberations from THAT... kind of hurt actually.

'AAAARRRGH!' She was inpatient by nature and getting frustrated. Hal Jordan could have had this thing on the other side of the galaxy by now, but she just didn't have his willpower. Not even 1% of it. Not YET, anyway. So she formed a giant drill.

She found that the asteroid itself, though massive, was relatively soft. And drilling to the center of it was fairly easy. Once that was done, she refocused the Ring's energy into a bomb - as powerful a bomb as she could conjure, and placed it in the center of the giant rock.

There was no sound. Because, of course, she was in space.

But there were cracks. Big ones. Seven bombs later, the asteroid was now in several, more manageable pieces. 'Atta girl!' she imagined Kilowog saying in her mind. 'If the problem’s too big? BREAK IT DOWN!'

And now what she couldn't just vaporize outright, she could now easily throw back into the asteroid belt.

Crisis abated, she flew back towards Earth.

As she descended through the atmosphere, she figured that she might as well do a few rounds on patrol. She slowed her speed as the skyline of Coast City came into view and, creating a headset, tuned her ring into the police's communication's frequency.

But it was now eight A.M. on a Saturday, and Ninety-Eight degrees outside. So there wasn’t much happening. But she flew around the city anyway, if only because she just loved doing it.

As she did, she tuned the headset to pick up radio frequencies and at least catch some tunes as she did her rounds high above the quiet metropolis. She found flying - especially to music - to be a truly life-affirming experience. It was the most amazing thing in the world to her, and she was completely convicted that the novelty would never wear off. If the Ring did nothing else (and truth be told there was pretty much nothing it couldn't do) THIS would still be worth it.

But today, something kept intruding into what should have been an almost Zen-like experience: Her nose kept growing increasingly itchy, and starting to run. She wiped it on the back of her hands several times, to the point that her glove started to feel wet, but it just kept growing worse. Then she caught the weather report: "High today expected to reach triple digits, not a drop of humidity and the pollen count is almost off the charts!"

'Ugh. This is going to be a LONG day,' she thought to herself, sniffing mightily and rubbing her nose with a glove that was now almost soggy.

The next song she heard was interrupted by an emergency bulletin. "This just in: A dangerous inmate has escaped from Belle Reve Penitentiary: Neal Emerson. Suspect should be considered armed and extremely dangerous.

'Doctor Polaris,' she thought to herself. This would be the biggest test of her abilities yet.

Finding him wasn't nearly as hard as finding the asteroid was: he was desperate, and this escape was apparently poorly planned and hastily executed. Following the trail of overturned cars and bent-over street lamps led her right to the small, family-owned convenience store where he was holed up, with hostages.

The cops had already surrounded it, but it was clear they were at a stalemate.

She floated down and landed near who she assumed was the officer in charged. As she started to talk, her nosed picked this moment to open the floodgates and start running profusely.

*SNIIIIIIFF* ‘That must be attractive,’ she thought to herself. "What's the situation, officer?"

The cop had heard rumors that there was a new Green Lantern, but he could barely hide his shock at how young she was. "Um... Two hostages: The man and wife who own the store."

"Any demands?"

"Only that we clear out. Which we ain't gonna do. Problem is we got nothin' he can't just throw right back at us with those powers of his."

"OK, *SNIIIIIFF*, Tell your men to hold their fire. I'm going in."

"Um... Are you sure? I mean... You O.K.?"

"Look, I know I'm younger than you expected, but I'm still the Green Lantern!"

"No, not that… I mean... Sorry, but you sound terrible. You sick?"

"*SNIIIIFFF* I'm fine. Tell you men to hold their fire - I don't want to get shot!" In actuality, the bullets would not harm her in the slightest, but she was concerned about the hostages and there was no telling what the magnetic-powered villain might do if he felt threatened.

She flew around to the back of the store, and went in through the rear door, activating her Ring’s protective aura as she did. It was hot in there. The air was either down, or they didn't have any. The tickle deep inside her nose blossomed into a thousand impatient feathers. She sniffed again, and ran her index finger along her nose doing one last allergic salute before calling out to her quarry.

"DOCTOR EMMERSON! YOU'RE COMPLETELY SURROUNDED! DO THE RIGHT THING AND... *SNIIIFFFFF!*" Oh man, THAT was embarrassing. Talk about an awkward pause.

"AND WHAT?!" the Super-villain called back.

"and l-let... *sniff* LET THE HOSTAGES GO. THIS CAN BETWEEN Y-YOU AND..." she paused again, trying to rub away the itchy, burning, tickling sensation that was quickly enveloping her entire face. "ungh… ME!"

He stepped out from behind the counter. She had a clear shot, but before she could act, every shelf in the place sprang to life and flew at her. She shot back with dozen tendrils of Green energy to hold them at bay.

"I will crush you!" Polaris boasted.

"I... doubt... it... *sniff*... oh... man... not...now...!"

The Ring worked on the user Willpower. And it took concentration - more than 99% of humans were even capable of. As it was, it took every bit of her mental strength and more to hold back the metallic barrage that Doctor Polaris was sending her way, and she could feel the weight of the magnetic energy behind the attack. If anything were to break her concentration, even for a second, there was no doubt in her mind that she would be pummeled.

A thin trail of watery mucus ran down over her lip. She ignored it.

The tickle in her nose now felt like a thousand man army, armed with spears, poking at the insides of her sinuses. She ignored that as well…

…for a few more seconds.

She held her breath and closed her eyes, and did everything she could to will it away, but it screamed at her from inside her nasal passages as if to say, “I WILL NOT BE IGNORED!”

"heh… het-chtxt...CHOO!"

Every shelf and display in the store hit her at once. The force was enough to push her through the back wall. She was stunned, but basically unhurt. But Polaris had now weakened the building to the point that it would collapse on the hostages. She used her Ring's energy to hold up the roof and yelled at them to get out, but by the time they were safely evacuated, Doctor Polaris had escaped.

The police were sympathetic, if also a bit patronizing, and she was really ticked off.

She flew off in a huff, but only made it a couple of block before her nose finally took over. Rather than fly around with her eyes mostly close, she ducked into an alleyway, found a box to sit on, and let the attack come over her.

"heh… haaaah… het-chtxt! Het-chmpgh-CHOO! Hatch-shoo! Heh… hah… *sniff* *wipe* HATCH-cmfptx! Man, *sniff*, this SUCKS!”

Making some tissues out the Ring’s energy, she blew her nose, and stood up. She was about to fly away, when she heard raised voice around the corner, further down the alleyway. She quietly crept up to take a look.

“Please don’t hurt me!” cried the woman’s voice.

There was a man with a gun pointed at her.

Carrie raised her right arm, aiming it directly at the gun. “DROP THE WEAPON!” she called out.

The man looked at her, but kept the gun on the woman. “This doesn’t concern you, b***h!”

Carrie didn’t want to risk him getting his shot off before her energy attack reach the gun. “Just p-put… it… d… dow… down…” ‘Oh crap!’ she thought, with another sneeze starting to spread its spindly tendrils throughout her upper respiratory tract. “hah… haaaaah… hhiiiAAAHTCH-TSCHOOO!”

When she open her eyes, the man was standing with a look of shock on his face and only the smoking remains of the pistol’s handle in his grip. ‘Thank god I was aiming for the gun!’ she thought. She could have just as easily shot the woman!

“You crazy b***h!” the man said, dropping what was left of the gun and taking off. She would have chased him, but another sneezing fit chose that moment to overtake her.

“Het-chmptxz! Hat-chmplt! Hah… haaah… HATCH-mplt… shoo!”

“Um... thanks? Are you… OK?”

“hah… haaaaah…. *sniff* Yeah. Just… *sniff*… het-TSCHOO! Aller… Allergies! HEEEAAAATCH-chmplt… shoo!”

“Um… Tissues?” the woman offered from her purse.

“No, thanks. I… *sniff* I gotta go!”

And before the woman could say anything else she took off, flying high into the sky in an effort to get some fresh air, free of any airborne irritants. Once she had regained her composure, she considered her options. The encounter with the mugger (rapist?) just now made her think that in her current state she might be as dangerous to bystanders as she was to criminals, so she decided to take a sick day. Before going home, she figured she’d stop at the house of her friend, Robbie Reynolds.

Mentally changing her uniform back into her ‘civvies’ she rang the front bell. As she waited the pollen started to get to her again, and she was a drippy, sneezy mess by the time he answered the door.

“Wow, babe. You look like a wreck!”

“*sniiiiffff* AIR CONDIONING!” she blurted out, before another sneeze had the chance to interrupt her. “And d-don’t… heeeetch-chmplt! Don’t call that!”

“Sure thing, Cair. Come on in, you look awf... I mean, you SOUND awful!” It was an awkward recovery on his part, and it made her smile. He had the biggest crush on her, and made little effort to hide it.

They had known each other since childhood, and they had been lifelong friends. He was a bit socially awkward, but then so was she. And she found his genuinely honest nature to be compelling. For her part she was also completely honest - brutally so at times – but that WAS one of the qualifications for her current job. He was a computer hacker extraordinaire (which frequently came in handy) and the only person on earth, outside of her parents, who she completely trusted – and the only civilian who knew about her alter ego. And even though she shared his feeling of affection, she did her best to keep them hidden. Not to lead him on, or out of a fear of rejection, but to protect him: Until she could fully control her powers, anyone close to her would be a target that she may not be able to protect. So as frustrating and awkward as it made things, she knew things had to remain platonic for now.

They went into his room and she sat down on the bed, holding some tissues against her nose trying to keep the next sneezing attack at by until the air conditioning had a change to clear things up.

“Do you… uh… want some meds? I think I’ve got some anti-histamines.”

“*sniff* No.” she answered, shaking her head. “Won’t work anyway.”

“Why’s that?”

“Sys… hah… haaatch-cht… shoo! Systematic antidote.”

“Ok… What’s that?”

“The ring… *sniff* *wipe* MAN, this is annoying! The Ring will automatically break down and dematerialize any foreign substance that enters my body. So I can’t be gassed, or poisoned or infected… with… HAAATHC-TSCHOO! …some weaponized disease. *sniff* Which is GREAT. But it also means I can’t get drunk, high or t-take… a-any… heeeEAAATCHOO!”

“Medicine?”

She sniffed again, and gave him the double pistol-shot with her hands.

“What about your shield? Can you make a sealed… what was it?”

“Sealed Systems. Yes. That IS another power of the Ring. It’s what lets me breath in space, and will also keep out any… airborne… hah… HATCH-tczht… shoo! You get the idea. I’m doubly protected that way. Nothing gets in, and anything does gets immediately broken… d-down… hah… haaaaah… HAAATCH… shoo!”

“Riiiiiight… Well, if the Ring’s all that, then what’s with all the dripping, sniffling and sneezing?”

“BECAUSE… *sniff* The Ring’s powers are completely useless against anything YELLOW!”

Robbie broke into a fit of hysterical laughter.

“What so… *sniff* *wipe* WHAT’S SO FUNNY?!”

“Hahahaaaah… Because… hahaaaaah! Because fire and bullets and even nerve gas can’t hurt you… but something as simple as the POLLEN COUNT can lay you low! You’re completely screwed! You can’t keep it out, the Ring won’t break it down for you and you can’t take anything for it! It’s like ragweed is your kryptonite!”

“*sniff* Ha-ha,” she shot back sardonically. “It’s not ragweed anyway. It all the dang… gr-grass and t-t-trees… heeEETCH-tztch… shoo! I thought this place was air conditioned?! W.T.F?”

Robbie just shrugged.

“Anyway, it’s not funny. I lost my concentration twice today because if it. The first time got me pummeled by Doctor Polaris and the second time I might have almost killed someone!”

“What happened?” he asked, settling down a bit.

“I was… *sniff* I was concentrating on his gun, and I sneezed and the Ring went off. Vaporized the gun, but if hadn’t be aiming so carefully beforehand, I might have just as easily h-hit… hit the hostaaaaage…aaaAAAHTCH-cht… shoo!”

Robbie was laughing again. “You SNEEZED and vaporized the dude’s gun? That ROCKS!”

“Robbie! I could have hit the WOMAN! My eyes were closed for cripes sake!”

That settled him down again.

“Anyway,” she paused to blow her nose again. “I’m going to have to figure this out. I can’t just call in sick four months out of the year. It’s not that kind of job.”

“Well, babe: you’re welcome to stay here until you feel better.”

“*sniff* Thanks. But would you please stop calling me that?!”

-END-

[NoV]

Ha, enjoyed this a lot Superpowers and sneezing = epic