Huh, I guess Jessica got traded back.

For some reason, I thought Jessica Cruz was going to spend a longer stint with a yellow ring; she's got a Green Lantern ring again in current books. But, I got hung up on other continuity here: from 2021, Green Lantern Annual #1, "Exposure Therapy" Written by Ryan Cady, art by Sami Basri and Tom Derenick.

I do believe this was another--and maybe not even the most recent--DC Hal Jordan push, "thou shall have no Lanterns before me." The power battery had blown up--again--and Green Lanterns were mostly powerless, but Jessica Cruz had managed to defeat three of the Sinestro Corps, including Sinestro's second-in-command Lyssa Drak. (Lyssa will look familiar to Legion of Super-Heroes fans, she's an ancestor of Shadow Lass!) Using a commandeered yellow ring, Jessica brings them to New Korugar, but Lyssa claims she never surrendered, and turns fear back on Jessica, breaking free. Still, Sinestro is impressed with her, and tells Lyssa to leave her "intact." (A bit of face-saving for Lyssa there!)

Jessica has nightmares, but strangely, doesn't find them scary now. She wakes up in quarters, with Sinestro's caption boxes explaining she wasn't a prisoner--there weren't cells or shackles there, they would be "redundant." Sinestro explains, he was bringing order to the galaxy, and describes himself as "an altruist." I am going to stop right there; because this is a point I harp on all the time, and it has to have been retconned out as this point: what happened to the Bolovaxians?

We saw a sweet Katma Tui/Flodo Span panel from Green Lantern Corps #218 a million years ago; but a group of Lanterns was stuck on the far side of the universe after a battle with Sinestro (backed by the "mad galaxy" Sector 3600) and getting sucked through a black hole. They defeated five alien murderers, but then Kilowog examines their now-deserted planet, and realizes it would work; finally telling the others his secret: his world, Bolovax Vik, had been destroyed in the Crisis. Kilowog's ring had automatically protected him, but since the communal Bolovaxians were "all the same" it had also saved all sixteen billion of them, converted into energy. Kilowog explains, they wouldn't have bodies as such anymore, but they could live again here, and the other GL's agree to help. They terraform the planet, and Kilowog releases them all from his ring. The Bolovaxians are overjoyed, as is Kilowog: they try to carry him, but aren't solid enough: Kilowog uses his ring to lift himself up, "Not so you can see me, but so I can see you!"

The planet then immediately explodes. Kilowog was unable to save the Bolovaxians this time: sixteen billion dead, as Sinestro's giant face appears, having caught up with them. And that's why, I've repeatedly asked, why isn't Kilowog snapping Sinestro's neck every single time he appears? Some sins can't be forgiven. Even for an "altruist." (From 1987, Green Lantern Corps #218, "Inside Some Other Skies!" Written by Steve Englehart, pencils by Bill Willingham, inks by Mark Farmer.)

Back to Jessica's story: she declines Sinestro's offer of a yellow ring, only wanting to return to earth. Sinestro shrugs, oh well, but if you want to get back to earth, this was the only way; and she could give the ring to whoever he appoints for sector 2814 later. (Jonathan Crane, maybe.) Flying home, cursing Sinestro out, Jessica realizes, the other Lanterns like her partner Simon Baz probably didn't have power. She also finds a spaceship of refugees, which had a number of problems, as Sinestro oh-so-helpfully explains like a videogame cutscene: radiation leak, indecisive captain, panicky refugees, nervous trigger-happy guards, and oh yes, the ship was going to fly right into earth's moon. Also not unlike a videogame, Jess then has to save the ship by hitting various objectives, all on Sinestro's terms: commandeering the ship, scaring an engineer into doing his job, giving them all something to be afraid of together. It all works, up until when Hal Jordan shoots her in the back. Hal steps back quickly, but does still ask what the hell she was doing: he's not a great listener, accusing her of stabbing him in the back, and of taking "a job interview with Sinestro" in the middle of this disaster. Hal opts to take over the rescue, but Jessica can still feel fear, and fixes her mistake: the captain had been indecisive, because his second-in-command and the security had been pirates, who had taken over the ship.

Hal isn't sure what to do with Jessica, but he's not her boss anymore: she returns to Sinestro, to take a power battery. While she doesn't trust him, Sin doesn't expect or need that from her; and even Lyssa seems welcoming, in a rather creepy way. I don't know if we saw much of Jess with the yellow ring, though; everybody who had a green ring probably got them back in relatively short order. Might've been a wasted opportunity, this.