The Last Days of Krypton

by Kevin J. Anderson

  The open, bright spacecraft might be a looming trap, but the power that this alien exhibited, the audacity of what he had done to Kandor—the Commissioner longed to know much more. If the alien wanted to hurt him, Zod could do nothing about it anyway. He forcibly drove down his inner panic, his natural tendency to fear this powerful vessel and obviously destructive enemy. The only way to take the upper hand would be to show no hesitation.

  He gave a cautious signal to Nam-Ek, then gathered his courage and squared his shoulders. He strode toward the alien ship, showing no fear. “I am Zod. I represent Krypton. Explain yourself to me.”

  The exotic humanoid gestured toward the hatch. “Come, I will show you all that you wish to know.”

  Zod walked up the ramp, determined to radiate an air of confidence. “What are you? Where do you come from?” The interior of the ship smelled of polished metal along with an exotic stew of scents: dirt, vegetation, lightning.

  The disks on the smooth green scalp glowed golden. “I am a Brain Interactive Construct, an android. My planet is—was—called Colu. I was created and sent out to catalog worlds for the Computer Tyrants to conquer.”

  “So, a spy.”

  “A gatherer of data.” With a small gesture of his synthetic hands, the android activated the polished white walls, converting them into projection screens. An image resolved out of many points of light to display a rocky, icy landscape, covered with vast industrial cities and cordoned-off camps on the outskirts where human slaves lived squalid lives. Colu. The image faded after Zod had absorbed it.

  As he stepped deeper into the vessel’s watery yellow light, he spotted tiny Kandor in its dome, a carefully preserved model city on display in a museum. And Krypton’s capital wasn’t the green-skinned android’s only prize. He saw a dozen other bottled cities, each one a landmark of unusual architecture, bathed in artificial lights to simulate their respective suns.

  One sample city was composed of black rock built up like pieces of a coral reef, and a tiny ocean swirled around the boundaries under the dome; another terrarium contained an intricately grown forest village; a third was filled with dirt and riddled with a labyrinth of tunnels, like a child’s diggerbug farm. One specimen city had buildings that seemed to be made of melting wax; another was a floating cluster of lavender bubbles with butterfly-winged inhabitants flitting from place to place. The populations in each specimen dome seemed to be thriving.

  “The Computer Tyrants are long forgotten except by me. I do this for myself. And for them.” He looked at the domed cities. “I have saved them all.”

  Zod stepped closer to the energy dome that encapsulated Krypton’s capital. He wondered if the tiny people inside could see his gigantic face looming over them. “Is that why you were sent here?”

  “I came of my own free will.” The android sounded very proud of the fact. “I am no longer the subservient construct the Computer Tyrants created.”

  Zod waited for him to continue, still puzzled by the alien’s oddly nonthreatening attitude after having caused such horrific destruction.

  “In order to make me a better spy, the Computer Tyrants twinned me with a slave boy. I took all of his emotions, his thoughts and his desires. I believe he took much from me as well.” The android sounded almost wistful. Another image shimmered on the smooth wall screen, displaying a thin dark-haired youth with lean features and sunken eyes, haunted by a brief lifetime overloaded with fear and oppression. Even so, the image seemed almost…idealized.

  “Once we were twinned, the boy should have been my longtime companion. The ship was ready to depart on my survey mission, but the boy escaped just before I took off. He surprised me.” The wall image sparkled and vanished. “I miss him.”

  The green android seemed genuinely sad. “And so I went from star system to star system by myself. That was centuries ago. I studied many planets, searching for perfect cities.” In separate projections around the ship’s main chamber, more images showed spectacular landscapes of world after world, exotic places such as Zod had never imagined.

  Then he saw a sparkling portrait of Kandor. “Krypton was one of my favorites,” the android said.

  Zod drove back his feelings of being overwhelmed. All those places, world after world raided by this creature…and no one on Krypton had ever known of the threat. Kryptonians had been obliviously, and intentionally, unaware of so much. The Council members had hidden their heads in the sand for centuries. Damn them! “Then why didn’t your Computer Tyrants invade us?”

  The Brain Interactive Construct stood close to Zod, also staring down at bottled Kandor. “Because I never told them about Krypton.” His artificial face shaped itself into a placid smile. “The Tyrants had programmed me to feel their need to dominate biological life-forms, but after I was twinned with the young boy, I also understood other components of the equation. I valued peace and beauty. I valued harmony and personal interaction. Those were the things the poor slave boy longed for most.” He lowered his voice. “However, when I had gathered all the necessary data, I returned to Colu, as my programming demanded of me. I had no choice.”

  Now shimmering images formed on all the wall screens, creating an overwhelming symphony of dark and bleak recordings. Zod saw scene after scene of total destruction, wrecked industrial cities, bodies and machines strewn through streets and across a barren landscape. “But when I arrived home, my planet had been devastated. All of the Computer Tyrants were annihilated in a great war. All of the slaves had rebelled against the machines.”

  “Intriguing.” Zod thought he should feel relieved. “They won?”

  “In a sense, perhaps. But every scrap of life was wiped out as well. Colu was dead.” The walls grew blank again, as if the android could no longer bear to view the images. He stood stock-still, reviewing files in his cybernetic mind.

  “I dug through the rubble for two years alone until I found intact data cores. When I uploaded everything that had happened in my absence, I learned that the cause of the destruction was none other than my own ‘twin.’ After the slave boy had shared with me, after I had become partially human and he had become partially machine, he understood how to overthrow the Computer Tyrants. He destroyed our world.”

  Grainy archival images showed the revolt, slaves throwing themselves against the minions of the Computer Tyrants, being slaughtered by the millions, and still coming, and coming, like fanatics. And leading them was an older, hardened version of the haunted boy who had been twinned with the android.

  The alien hung his pale green head. “A powerful empire, nothing more than dust. If the boy had learned some key information through sharing with me, then I, by extension, caused the vulnerability that brought about the downfall of my planet.” He looked at Zod, his expression now full of anguish. “How can I endure that knowledge?”

  The Commissioner squashed any sympathy he might have felt for the pathetic android. “That doesn’t explain why you stole Kandor—or all these other cities. Just because your world was destroyed, what gives you the right to ransack other planets?”

  “Ransack? I mean only to protect them, preserve them. When I take these precious cities back to Colu, I can restore them, put them into their proper places. Kandor was one of my most marvelous discoveries, and so I will keep it safe against anything bad that might happen. It is a good and noble deed.”

  Zod was aghast. “But stealing Kandor! Do you have any concept of what that will do to our society?” He had barely begun to think through such questions himself…and maybe the result wasn’t all bad.

  The green-skinned alien was unmoved. “As I learned on my own planet, nothing lasts forever, and these gems of civilization deserve to be saved. What if some terrible disaster were to destroy Krypton?”

  Zod fought back a disbelieving snort at the suggestion that anything so calamitous would ever happen to his world.

  The Brain Interactive Construct gazed at him. “If you wish, Zod, I can allow you to join your comrades. I can miniaturize and
insert you into the dome, where you will be under my protection forever. It is your choice.”

  “I have no wish to live inside a specimen case.”

  Zod suppressed a smile as he began to realize what had unexpectedly fallen into his lap. New thoughts fought through his daze of disbelief. The Kryptonian Council was gone, the old government stripped away…but he remained. Only Zod. And Krypton’s desperate population would demand a strong and confident leader, now more than ever. At last this was the opportunity to work the changes he had always known must be made. He had waited all his life for a chance like this.

  Viewed from a certain perspective, this was a miracle, not a tragedy.

  “No, I will stay behind to help my people recover from this great loss.” Magnanimously, the Commissioner added, “You can have Kandor—and I will take the rest of Krypton.”

  When Zod emerged from the alien ship, he motioned for Nam-Ek to accompany him. The muscular mute was ecstatic to see his mentor unharmed.

  Zod was flushed, his mind spinning. The Council, Kandor, Jor-El’s inquisition—everything—simply brushed off the playing board! “It’s going to be all right, Nam-Ek. In fact, everything will be just fine.”

  They turned to watch as the ominous ship lifted away from the smoking crater that had been Kandor. It flew off into the night, leaving Zod as the only real witness, the one person who knew the true story of what had happened.

  And he could use that to his advantage.

  CHAPTER 34

  All of Krypton reeled from the sudden loss of the capital city. And, exactly as Commissioner Zod expected, the frightened people looked to him for guidance.

  Immediately taking charge, he declared a planetary state of emergency, dispatched messages to all major population centers, and established his command post just outside the deep, steaming crater. Thousands of displaced refugees remained in the area, those whose homes were located outside the perimeter of destruction, as well as hundreds of Kandor citizens who had simply been away on that fateful night and had returned to find the city gone.

  Unlike the tsunami at Argo City, the clean, abrupt loss of Kandor created none of the usual aftereffects of a natural disaster: few injured, no rescue efforts, no massive recovery operations. The capital city was simply gone. All that remained was a huge, deep scar on the Kryptonian psyche, as well as a blot on the landscape.

  As the news spread, volunteers and spectators rushed in from Borga City, Orvai, Ilonia, Corril, and many smaller settlements. Some of them brought emergency supplies, tents, food, water, and construction materials. Soon the second wave came, stricken pilgrims who traveled to the crater just to stare in shock and mourn the loss of their beloved capital. Everyone assumed that the population of Kandor was dead, and Zod did not disabuse them of the idea.

  The Commissioner walked among the people here, showing strength and perhaps a little compassion. He spoke briefly with one man who had been late returning from a visit to the mountains; his wife and three daughters had gone ahead to Kandor and were now gone, leaving him all alone. An aspiring sculptor came by himself all the way from the lake district; he fell to his knees at the crater’s edge and wept for hours, though he had never previously been to Kandor.

  Nam-Ek often stood alone at the lip of the crater, staring down into the pit, clenching and unclenching his fists. The big man no doubt still wondered if he could have fought the alien android and reversed the disaster. Zod quietly consoled him. The two stood apart from all the shell-shocked visitors and eager workers who swarmed around the empty site with little to do, not knowing where to begin work of such magnitude.

  “In the end I believe Krypton will be stronger, Nam-Ek. Not only did the alien take our city, he also took away the useless Council. The more I think about it, the more it seems like an acceptable trade-off. With their obstructionist ways and their narrow vision, those eleven caused as much harm as any outside invasion. And I have a chance to make it right. Now, more than at any other time in centuries, Krypton needs a man who can be a true, efficient leader. A man like me.”

  As he looked around himself at the overwhelming crowds of stricken but resolute survivors and volunteers, Zod formulated his plans to utilize their angry determination. If he could cement them into a unified fighting and working force, these people would become his most dedicated followers. He had to act swiftly.

  Zod’s initial challenge was to establish a permanent settlement near the crater’s perimeter. For the moment his goal was a clean and organized camp. The administrative and support realities of such a large group would swiftly make living conditions miserable…and if people were miserable, they could easily turn against him. As a precaution, he also recruited the remaining Sapphire Guards, who had lived outside the city in training barracks.

  Without delay, he laid out the settlement on a grid and put together teams to erect large tents and ser viceable shelters. They drilled for water, installed pumps, erected sanitation facilities. The food supplies brought by emergency workers were gathered into large community depots. Meals were prepared and served in a long communal mess hall.

  Tireless in his inspiration, he organized the ever-growing crowds into work groups. So long as he kept the refugees busy and focused on the obvious threat of outside enemies, no one would have time to question his assumption of total authority. From his experience with the other lackluster city leaders on Krypton, he knew it would be more than a month before anyone else even thought to suggest a plan, and by then it would be too late.

  At noon on the third day, after he had carefully practiced his speech, Zod stood at the center of the camp on a quickly erected stage. In a clear, commanding voice he issued his statement, and the shaken people looked up at him, comforted that someone had shouldered this heavy responsibility. The Commissioner doubted anyone else on Krypton would rush to volunteer for the job.

  “Because we no longer have the Council to guide us, it falls upon me to keep our world safe. This unspeakable attack shows that we must change our passive and stagnant ways. We were isolated for so many centuries, foolishly believing that hostile outsiders would leave this planet in peace. But now they have found us!” He pointed vehemently toward the yawning crater, where wisps of yellowish-gray smoke continued to curl into the air.

  Zod had already told a somewhat altered version of what he’d witnessed, and rumors continued to embellish the horrors of that night. He had changed the android’s name to something more sinister than “Brain Interactive Construct.” Brainiac. He had painted the android’s story in the worst possible light, removing any hint of sympathy, making the green-skinned android the embodiment of everything unspeakable and frightening. He had not mentioned the possibility that the miniaturized inhabitants might actually still be alive.

  “What if Brainiac returns for Borga City next?” Zod swept his gaze around, listening to the cries of dismay. “Or Orvai? Or Corril? Argo City is already reeling from the damage done by the tidal wave—how could they possibly defend themselves? How could any of us?” Zod had no intention of calming the already terrified people. Fear was a very efficient tool. “How many outside enemies are even now plotting against Krypton?”

  His face was grim, yet full of an angry confidence. “Outsiders may believe that we are an easy target, that we have forgotten how to defend ourselves and how to fight—but they are sorely mistaken! We can do this if you will follow me.” He was not at all surprised when the crowd gave a rousing cheer. What else would they do?

  After his speech, Zod returned to his command tent during the heat of the afternoon. A dark-haired woman sauntered up to him, put one hand on her hip, and raised her pointed chin. “Those were fine words, Commissioner. Maybe you are better than the other nobles and the silly Council members after all.”

  He was both surprised and pleased to see her. “Aethyr, you are safe!”

  “That’s one advantage to living in isolation and touring ancient ruins.”

  He let out a dry laugh. She had struck him as a
definite survivor.

  “Yes, you did unfairly dismiss me as a representative of the establishment you despised.”

  “I may have been too quick to make that assumption. I hated the old government for being ineffectual. To me, anyone who worked in that system had a vested interest in the status quo.”

  “Then you misjudged me.”

  “I can see that now.”

  He tried to gesture her inside his tent, but she remained where she was. He said, “If you have come to accept my offer of a special dinner, your timing is awkward. We may have to settle for food in the mess hall.” Zod still found her beautiful, her haughty attitude intriguing. Remembering how fearlessly she had scorned the stuffy expectations of Kryptonian society, he knew Aethyr was exactly the sort of person he needed at his side now.

  She turned slowly, looking at the camp, at the organized people already getting back to work, making progress. “You have accomplished quite a lot in only a few days and under the most extreme circumstances, Commissioner. The old Council would have taken this long just to decide which robes to wear while inspecting the disaster. Has any other city leader done more than wail and gnash his teeth?”

  Zod considered, trying to hide his smile. “I doubt it.”

  “You’ll disappoint me greatly if the old style of government crystallizes around you again.” Her voice had a warning tone.

  He wondered what she was getting at, found himself reluctant to play her game. “Who says I will allow such a thing to happen? The Council is gone.”

  She laughed now and gently touched his arm. “I was hoping you would say that. In fact, I can help you.” Leaning close, she lowered her voice to a whisper. “I have an offer you can’t afford to decline.”

  “Intriguing. What do you suggest?”

  “I’ve come from the ruins of Xan City. I have walked through the ancient capital of the warlord Jax-Ur.”

  “And how could some old ruins possibly interest me? Especially now?”