c24.1

(Komand'r)

Digistation

Portal room of Kandor

In a hurry, we built the portal generator controlling access to Kandor. There were multiple objectives fulfilled by getting Alura out to save Kara. We proved that we had complete control on the technology we took from Brainiac and that it was a matter of time for the Kryptonians to be free of their bottled city.

Already, I had the bare bones of a plan to get everything they lost back. It involved certain ingots of creation… but I will need to convince them to move universes. This was a long shot, I was helping them out of the goodness of my heart but I also hoped they would be willing to follow me. The portal looked like a rushed mish mash of technology and ended up being similar to a stargate. Thick superconducting cables laid all around the pedestal the portal's ring was encased in.

The device had two jobs: transport someone from a bottled city from the digital world and unshrink them at the same time. In its current state it was highly greedy in energy; MACHINA didn't yet have the time to streamline the technology she usually did.

The portal opened, blue light of all shades swirled inside the ring and then the Sexy MILF, Alura Zor-El appeared before me and slowly descended the stairs part of the portal's pedestal. "Welcome to Odyssey, Lady Zor-El."

I caught her and kissed her full on the lips, she barely struggled and I felt that she wasn't used to being embraced this way. But I couldn't let that chance slip to acquire the kryptonian language. I was daring enough to show her my tongue skills and she melted into my arms.

It was a moment later when I let go of Alura and she looked at me with glazed over eyes. I smiled cockily at her and then she snapped back to reality. Different emotions showed on Alura's face as her expression shifted. Next she passed a hand through her hair and combed it with her fingers. She must have realized that I used my language assimilation ability on her.

*No more having MACHINA translate for me.*

I heard that! And mom, don't target married women! MACHINA reprimanded.

*It was just a bit of fun, MACHINA. Nothing serious.* I played it out like usual; I kissed Pepper who was in a relationship without repercussions, after all.

"Greetings… your highness." Alura began fanning herself with her hand.

With a chuckle at the woman's expression, I grabbed her hand and wrapped her in my Starbolt aura. "Come, we don't have time to dawdle."

And we left the digistation room while flying toward the nearest teleporter. Alura looked around herself as if she was a tourist, the white metallic corridors, glowing lines used in the lighting scheme weren't that interesting though. We reached the nearest teleporter, I waved my hand before the screen next to the small computer inside the room and we were transported directly to the hangar's teleporter.

When the door opened, Alura gasped; further in the room there was a sleek ninety meter crystal spaceship waiting in the Null-Gravity ship berth. It looked like a manta ray but way bigger; its wings were folded vertically to conserve space.

"How come you have an interceptor class frigate here? This model was still in its design phase, before Brainiac's…" Alura pointed a finger at the white colored crystal spaceship.

The wings on the frigate unfolded and a hatch opened from the aft of the spaceship, letting a ramp slide out from it. With a metallic sound, it reached the ground.

"Climb in with me." I told Alura, as I chose to not tell her yet about what she wanted to know.

Pulling Alura by the arm toward the entrance of the spaceship, the interior of the crystal ship used spatial folding, making it bigger on the inside. Alura raised her hand and looked at the skin on top of it. "Hmm, I feel some kind of pressure in the air. MACHINA are you using some kind of energy field to create gravity inside? The ship cargo module we're walking in is made from Kryptium, I recognize the shade of the metal; it's only available on Krypton, where did you get… ah, yes your replicators."

Mom! She's guessing all the stuff I put in my ship, I can't brag in the Kandor council chambers if she guesses everything! MACHINA's holographic avatar appeared on my shoulders, showing that she had filled the ship with holographic projectors everywhere.

"Ah, I was right. Good." Alura smugly said as she strutted her stuff as we passed the bulkhead connected to the ship's corridor.

"What did you expect to happen? You used her people's technology." I mercilessly added.

But I wanted to make my own forerunner spaceship! MACHINA sighed and hugged my neck while in her chibi form.

She was obsessed with the Halo video games, knowing that it was thanks to it that she was born, since I copied the human and Precursors technology to create her with TALI. But at least she had a hobby, I understood that some Smart AI like her could be driven to suicide if they didn't occupy their time with something fulfilling. Alura and I quickly arrived at the central bridge, in the most armored part of the ship.

The bridge was completely empty, no consoles, no windows or seats. Just walls made of sunstone and beams supporting the bridge space made of crystal. As we approached the center of the bridge, a command chair which looked like a throne made of crystals raised from the ground; a smaller chair with a console looking like a liquid geo workstation emerged five meters from the command chair.

Neural control baby! I hope you'll like it, Captain Komand'r. MACHINA explained.

"No forward bridge?" Alura asked as I let go of her hand, she went directly to sit at the console with the crystalline interface.

She turned to me once I sat on the command chair. "No, only people with a death wish make those; no exposed bridge, no forward one. It should always be where there's the most armor in the ship."

I really missed the Hyperdimension, the bridge there could move and be concealed. "Okay, Alura. To answer your earlier question about how we got the schematics for your next generation of ships, I must tell you that when we killed Brainiac, we took everything, his tacky skull spaceship, the bottled cities, the technological and cultural databanks, the drones and robots..."

His life too, Mom. It was so satisfying to see him plead for his life… after everything he's done. MACHINA said with a bloodthirsty smile.

The console came alive, as well as the holographic crystal walls that showed the environment outside the ship; the hangar was teeming with drones flying from fighter ships to smaller sized scout ships, repairing, adding more crystal sunstone armor. Alura stood transfixed, but her mood soured as she realized that it wasn't her people's achievements.

"Strap in, we're going to exit the station." The ship lifted thanks to the buffering field around it, and I closed the hatch in the aft section. The hangar's door opened, and slowly, the ship used the gravitic engine to cross the one kilometer distance between the Null-Gravity berth and the exit.

A harness made of soft crystalline material grew from Alura's and my seat; despite the internal buffer field inside the ship taking care of the inertial dampening when the ship moved, it was better to have backup systems to protect the crew. We quickly ended up in space, with the red planet under us; the ship responded to my thoughts and handled like a dream.

It was like piloting a heavier starfighter… "MACHINA, you do good work."

Thanks! The smart AI exclaimed in a proud tone.

"This ship works on a completely different principle than the one created on Krypton. As I look at the engineering console, there's systems I don't recognize the functions of at all. Hmm, this ship doesn't use a Phantom drive, but a translight engine? Does it work by accessing higher dimensions? I'm so confused right now."

While accessing the astrometrics, I accessed the side-scanning abilities of the ship's sensors. While doing this, I told Alura, "This is MACHINA's project, she's been using your people's technology as a stepping stone to master an obscure and new field of science called Neural-Physics. You'll have to speak to her if you want her to share the tech and the research she's done with you."

I caught a ping on the astrometrics, there was something small and rather fast that was just reaching Jupiter. Plotting an intercept course with MACHINA's help, I opened a portal into slipspace, and the ship entered the blue colored circle of spatial rupture.

"Neural-physics?" Alura asked, as she was taking notes with her own wrist computer; it seemed she wanted to show some of my capabilities to the other council members.

I didn't tell her to stop, she didn't even realize that this wasn't the only technology I had access to. The Tempest scout ship was more advanced than this crystal spaceship and worked on a completely different technological base. Sometimes, to deceive your enemies, you had to deceive your friends.

Shaking my head, I refused to try to elaborate. "Don't ask me, it goes over my head when she tries to explain what it is."

We must have stayed one minute in the slipstream corridor, before we could finally see its end. It was MACHINA who announced, Exiting Slipspace Rupture.

We traversed 3.68 AU in one minute; this was not bad for the shakedown flight of this new ship. We appeared just behind the asteroid belt and were in full view of Jupiter which was the size of a golf ball on screen. Kara's ship was still midway between us and the gas giant.

I addressed the Kryptonian scientist. "Alura, do you have your codes?"

"Yes." She started typing a really long sequence on the Kryptonese holo-keyboard projected by the console.

I noticed that Alura didn't use the Liquid-Geo mode at all. I doubt that Alura will want to use the old tech once she gets cozy on the Odyssey with Kara. "Send out the signal with the master codes to make the ship drop out of FTL."

That was something I've learned about Kryptonian, they automate everything and think about every possibility. They had the same outlook about life in space as humanity from Star Trek, but Kryptonian scientists were an overly cautious lot. That's why they stayed in isolation for four thousand years. They could teach a thing or two to Reed Richards.

"Code entered and… accepted."

A ringed portal of turbid black color came open on the background of the space filled stars; out of it a crystal ship almost shaped like a Halo energy sword exited. It was black and absorbed the light striking its surface; it was supposed to be some custom stealth model from what MACHINA showed of its scans. I immediately used the tractor beam equipped on this ship and a green attenuated linear graviton beam shot from the muzzle of the frigate and caught the small ship. The tractor beam pulled the small vessel into the forward shuttle bay.

"We got her." Alura said with relief.

"Yeah, now let's go back to Odyssey." I said while using the thrusters to turn the ship toward Mars' direction.

Once I orientated the crystal spaceship, MACHINA opened a portal and we were quickly en route back to my home away from home.

~/.\~

(Kara Zor-El)

Kara was once again finding herself in the streets of Kandor not for shopping with her friends, but to hide from Brainiac's robots. A terrible monster whose reputation made even the Green Lantern avoid him at all cost. There would be no help from the Guardians. As she thought this, more people were running toward the central tower where there should be a shelter designed for this type of situation, the Military guild troops tried to stop them. They were however defeated because they didn't have heavier weaponries than plasma blasters. Once again Kara cursed the paranoid council for demilitarizing the planetary union.

Kara wanted to run toward a shelter, but she didn't; she knew what was going to happen if she did, hiding was meaningless. Brainiac was winning and knowing his reputation, he was going to blow up the planet. The blonde turned her head toward the tall silver spire that she saw that was quite far from her position. She noticed movements and saw more Brainiac's bots coming toward her.

Kara needed to run toward the arcology, it was where Uncle Jor had stashed the ship to enable their escape from Krypton. It was at this moment that more Kandorian militia troops came to clash with the robots. Surprise they had a plasma gatling turret on their vehicle. They started firing into the robot crowd and took some of them out.

Kara took advantage of the distraction to duck and flee into a tunnel created by a downed skyscraper; the hole was way too tight for the death machines to follow her in. Crouching, the blonde girl crawled like a moolrat in the dry tunnel, ignoring the sharp shards of crystals lacerating her skin; she continued advancing until she reached the light at the end of the tunnel.

Crawling out of the hole, Kara looked out for any sign of survivors or Brainiac bots, she realized that she was almost there; the tunnel having made her cross half the distance to the arcology. She traversed the park full of singing flowers and purple flora. As she followed the road, she became aware of metallic sounds on the bricked road. There were more bots near, that is why she ran toward the entrance. She didn't look behind her as she heard noises of pursuit.

When she entered she punched the button on the security panel and the blast door covered the entrance. She knew this wasn't going to stop the Brainiac bots following her. Taking her comm-computer from her pocket, Kara navigated her device and opened her contact list, and called her mother.

She picked up the call on the first ring. "Kara, is that you?"

"Mother!" The girl yelled aid in relief, she was breathing hard. Kara's heart soared with hope as she saw her mother's face.

Alura wore a golden Kryptonian battlesuit with the house of El's sigil emblazoned on her chestplate; surely something that she pulled out of the El Family vault. "Where are you? Wait, it doesn't matter, I traced your call, I'm coming for you."

Kara's mother took an old style battle rifle in her hands and loaded a battery pack in the butt of the weapon. Kara heard the banging sounds on the blast door, it started to be deformed by the impact of the brainiac's bots. "No! T-they are at the entrance, and the blast door isn't going to hold for long."

Alura lowered her rifle and looked at her daughter who was obviously already moving through the arcology as she recognized her surroundings. "Okay, take the elevator to level ten and join me! Your dad and I are done with readying the ship!"

"I'm coming!" Then Kara cut the call and ran toward the nearest elevator bank on the ground floor.

The blast door finally gave in, and Kara saw the death bots march toward her; but before that, she entered into the elevator and typed the number of the level she wanted to access on the panel computer. The door closed and she then looked at the panel, and decided to be more proactive and hacked the elevator system with her wrist mounted computer.

In thirty seconds of slicing through the systems, Kara made it so that none of the other elevators could work, stopping for now any pursuit from the damn bots. This was a felony that could have landed her in hot water some hours ago, but she doubted the government was still intact at this point. After this, Kara quickly reached the tenth level, and on the floor her family owned, she met her mother.

Alura hugged her daughter with one arm and congratulated her, "Good job on the elevator systems."

"Yeah, I didn't want those Rao-damned bots to reach us." Kara was so happy to see her mother that she couldn't stop herself from bragging.

With her battle rifle at the ready, Alura said, "Come, we don't have much time, Kara."

The two started walking toward the spaceship's hangar, level ten was technically a personal research facility for the house of El. The council may have put the scientist of the family under house arrest for trying to warn them about Brainiac approaching and trying to get the military back up to standard, but they couldn't confiscate a house's personal property. This would have set a bad precedent and made them tyrants in the eyes of the population, no better than Zod; they would have been overthrown rather fast by most of the remaining noble houses.

Kara noticed how hurriedly her mother moved, it made her nervous. "What happened?"

With a clinical and clipped tone of voice, Alura answered Kara with, "Brainiac destabilized the planet's core, Krypton won't hold together much longer."

Kara widened her eyes and grabbed her mother's armored arm. "What? Can't we do anything, Mother?"

They had reached the door to the hangar which opened with a woosh sound, and out of it came a tall man with black hair and kind blue eyes in a black and silver battle armor. He said sadly as he looked his daughter in the eyes, "No, we can't."

"Father?!" Kara let go of Alura and hug-tackled her father who engulfed her in her embrace. "You're safe, Kara. Thanks Rao. When I lost you in the city, I thought you were lost."

"Me too!" Kara was elated.

Alura interrupted their reunion by pulling the two of them inside the hangar; she engaged the security system and a blast door covered the already closing entrance of the hangar. "Quick, husband." Kara looked in the middle of the hangar room, there was a black crystal ship, it looked sleek and fast.

Zor-El pushed Kara toward the locker room next to the lab space and instructed his daughter into putting on a Kryptonian spacesuit. It was blue and gold with a helmet in the form of a sphere; from what she could read on the user's manual it was equipped with technology similar to an environmental band, but more powerful and efficient. It provided breathable air, and protected from all environmental dangers, but would still let her absorb solar radiation.

When she was ready, she saw her father put something in the cargo space of the ship, it looked like a blue crystal embedded into a sphere. "We need to put her on the ship quickly, the Brainiac bots are coming. Did Jor-El already put Kal inside his ship?"

"He is waiting for us to launch, he sent Lara over to us." Alura reported as she performed a check on the ship's engine.

Kara frowned, there was enough space on the ship for three people. "Mom, what are you talking about? No one is going with Kal…? But he is just a baby."

Alura and Zor-El turned to their daughter, then glanced at each other. It seemed that there were parts of this plan that Kara wasn't made aware about. Alura let go of what she was doing and walked toward her daughter. The older blonde put a gauntleted hand on her daughter's pauldron and said in a soothing voice, "That is why we're sending you to protect him, to raise him and teach him our ways."

Kara stepped back away from her mother. "Me? Teach him? What about you or Lara?"

Then the girl finally realized what was going to happen, her father and mother intended to stay on the dying planet. With a hand on her mouth, kara gasped at what her parents were about to do; then she hug-tackled her mother and held tight onto her. "No. No. No, I won't leave you! Please, please don't make me!"

Alura's eyes started to tear up. "I can't come with you, but you'll never be alone, Kara." She hugged her daughter tighter. "You belong to the house of El, Kara. A house of Hope, never forget that. Never give up hope."

BANG. BANG. BANG.

Reality intruded on their moment, reminding them of the dire situation they were in. The Brainiac's bots were there for them. Alura took Kara's arm and pulled her to the ship. "Get on that ship, Kara!"

The hatch opened and Alura entered with her daughter, the door leading to the flight deck opened. Alura forced Kara to sit on the pilot seat and strapped her in. She kissed the transparent helmet of Kara and looked her in the eyes. "Please survive, live, and if you ever get the chance… avenge our people."

Alura left, the cockpit's walls went transparent, showing what was happening around the ship. The brainiac's bots had breached the blast door and were attacking. Kara's father took something from his belt and threw it at the death bots.

BOOM! It was some kind of EMP grenade, some of the bots fell but there were more behind them. Kara saw her mother who was behind the computer, typing on the workstation, she felt the spaceship's engine thrum and it began to levitate from the ground.

That was then when a Brainiac bot ran toward Alura and… stabbed her back with a sword mounted on its arm. Alura's body went slack. Kara screamed, "No! Mother!"

The ship orientated itself up and a countdown for launch appeared on the dashboard's screen. started to leave the hangar

Zor-El screamed, "You Rao damned tin can! Let go of my wife!"

Taking the sword of Rao from its scabbard, he threw himself at the bot. It was at that moment that Kara saw Lara, her aunt, appear from behind the tide of Brainiac's bots and shoot at them with a huge battle rifle. But the ship chose that moment to shoot out from the hangar. Right at this point, Kara was being catapulted toward space, with tears streaming down her eyes.

However, looming up in the sky was Brainiac's ship and Kara knew fear as the skull shaped monstrosity extended its tentacles toward her ship to catch it. But just at that moment, a huge white energy beam struck the skull ship's starboard. Kara looked down and saw one of the plasma cannons part of krypton's planetary defense fire at the invader's ship, cutting the tentacles that were about to snatch her vessel.

Brainiac's ship engaged its shield and focused on the immediate threat, giving Kara's ship time to escape into orbit. Thirty seconds later, Kara saw another black crystal ship like her own approach hers. She perked up and saw that it was baby Kal's vessel.

On screen the computer showed a command:

Docking mode engaged.

The ship was about to join Kara's, they came closer and closer; she could even see the laser signal of the docking sensors connecting the two vessels. Kara was happy to soon have baby Kal with her; but it wasn't to be… Kandor was bottled after Brainiac destroyed the defensive plasma cannon. The planet started vibrating and the computer warned that the destabilization of Krypton's core was finally complete. Countless cracks exposing the planet's mantle and golden faults filled with magma appeared on the surface of the planet and… Krypton exploded.

The shockwave of the explosion and some debris hit Kara's ship, making it deviate from docking trajectory.

Docking mode interrupted.

Further debris struck Kara's ship and made it deviate from course. "Kal! No! No, please! Kal!"

Kal's ship engaged its FTL drive, and it fled into an aperture in space taking with it the last member of Kara's family with it. Kara panicked and took control of her ship's computer and asked it to find a solution.

Ship damaged.

Port of call is now destroyed.

Damage to FTL engine at 30%.

Scanning for nearby ships.

The computer beeps while the screen of the dashboard's instrument starts glowing red in alarm.

Hostile detected; Stealth system engaged.

Kara saw the big bad's skullship advance toward the spot where Kal's ship had been. It stayed like this for over a minute before it entered FTL too and disappeared. Kara needed to do something! Baby Kal was counting on her, she continued to prompt the ship's AI to fix the problem.

Repair station not found in system. Searching for a solution.

Calculation…

Proposal: Self-repair time for Phantom Drive with current resource estimated to be 38 sun cycles. Mistress Kara should enter hypersleep while waiting for repair.

"What?!" It was unacceptable to Kara.

She needed to raise and protect Kal-El! However it seems that fate had over ideas. The ship must have been more damaged than she thought because the AI added:

Priority Protection protocol activated.

Placing Mistress Kara into hypersleep for her safety.

"Wait! Don't!" But it was too late and Kara's vision started to grow dim, until darkness took her.

"Wakey, wakey." Someone with a really teasing and feminine voice said as they touched her face.

She felt warm on her skin and vigor flowing back into her body. "Hmm."

"Lady Alura, she's waking up." The girl heard the same voice say.

She asked herself who it might be, then she felt another presence; the smell and heat of that person were… familiar.

Who was she?

What was she?

Where was she?

Then like a dam, all of her memories came back to her and Kara remembered. She immediately sat up from her lying position and shouted with her right arm up, "Mother!"

Almost immediately she was engulfed in a familiar scent and warmth. "Kara, my little flame bird."

The pieces of her heart were mended when she saw who it was that was hugging her. Kara looked shocked, she had seen her mother fall to one of Brainiac's robots. "You're alive! But… I saw you get stabbed by that Rao-damned brainiac bot!"

Kara looked around and realized that she was in some kind of medical ward. She laid on a bed, half naked, only wearing some kind of soft textured white shorts with a stretch bralette. The walls around her were a smooth white and there was a transparent window showing outside; the sky was a shade of orange with white clouds and two strangely shaped moons.

Her spacesuit was placed on the table next to her… Kara dared not hope, but Alura let go of her, peeled her bodysuit and gave her back to Kara to show a gnarled scar in the middle of her back. "Your father and your aunt, Lara, saved me; I was on the brink of death..."

A smooth and sultry voice interrupted the moment. "Lady Alura, the tales of your beauty were vastly understated, you really do have a nice pair of breasts."

Kara had forgotten that there were two voices when she woke up. She turned her head only to see a tall woman with deep purple hair, glowing green eyes, it seemed to be some kind of reflective glowing membrane that made part of her physiology; she also had orange skin, at least that's what Kara could see despite her black and silver full bodysuit that espoused her generous curves.

*Tamaranean.* Kara recognized the species from the Kryptonian compendium of races that her civilization had encountered. This was the first time she saw one in the flesh; and Kara liked what she saw, as this stranger was exotic and beautiful.

"Mother, who is this?" Kara asked as she saw Alura quickly zip back up her bodysuit, there was a dusting of red on her mother's cheeks.

Alura tried to not look at the smirking Tamaranean. "It's complicated…"

It was the first time she saw her mother act like a… schoolgirl with a crush. With the grace of a feline, the Tamaranean female walked up to Kara's bed and introduced herself. "I am Komand'r, First Princess of Tamaran."

*Of course she is.* Kara thought. She had to obviously deal with a Tamaranean royal after she just got out of hypersleep. That was her life, things tended to get weird because of the El family luck.

Alura looked at the deadpan expression of her daughter and decided to add, "She killed Brainiac and-"

Head whipping toward her mother, Kara shouted, "She what!?"

Princess Komand'r's smirk morphed into a grin and said teasingly to Kara's mother, "She has a good pair of lungs on her."

Kara blushed, the Tamaranean princess then looked at her with a hungry gaze; The young Kryptonian understood that she liked what she saw too. But it wasn't the time to think about such things!

Alura coughed and interrupted the two girls sizing up each other. "She's just confused after the hypersleep."

Kara couldn't deny that she had been a bit disoriented when she regained consciousness; but she was glad that her mother was here and… she finally noticed the age line on Alura's face. Alura Zor-El was 150 years old and at the time before Kara's escape from Krypton could be considered in human years to be in her late twenties physically.

Her mother looked like she had started to enter middle-age. Kara's mother was older! "Mother you look… older?"

Alura sighed and sat on her daughter's bed and put a hand on her shoulder, blue eyes looking sadly into Kara's own. "It's been thirty-eight sun cycles since I last saw you, my daughter."

Kara's mind abruptly stalled, and suddenly the memory of her escape from Krypton came to the fore as she remembered the proposition of the AI controlling her ship. So she did really spend 38 sun cycles in the Rao system, near the ruins of her planet and just recently came to.

"Thirty-eight… cycles? Wait, I saw Krypton explode… I've been asleep for that much time, then?" From the view outside, she realized that they weren't in the Rao system anymore; maybe they were in Sol.

"Unfortunately, you were." Alura sighed as her hand slid from Kara's shoulder to her forearm.

More memories flashed in Kara's mind. The bottling of the entirety of Kandor, she had seen it. "How are you here? Did Princess Komand'r really defeat Brainiac?"

"Yes, daughter. It's only thanks to Princess Komand'r that I'm here to welcome you. She has killed Brainiac and salvaged his ship and all the bottled cities that the monster had collected, amongst them Kandor. There's ten million Kryptonians who survived, she saved our species; amongst them most of our family."

Kara's heart started to beat into her chest in joy as she realized that despite having lost her homeworld, that her parents and other members of her family survived! "Father, you, uncle Jor and aunt Lara are all alive?"

Alura smiled and said simply, "Yes."

At this instant, Kara was a believer; in the end she survived and found her way back to her family. *If it's a dream… I don't want to wake up.*

Looking toward Komand'r, with clear hero worship, the blonde Kryptonian announced, "Thank you, your highness. I will forever be in your debt for what you did!"

~/.\~

(Komand'r)

Deck 149

Medical sector

Hospital room

I brought a newly fabricated Kryptonian bodysuit to Kara. It was blue with glowing red Tron lines on her flanks and had a red skirt integrated into it with the symbol of the house of El on her chest in red. The comics and animated cartoon had understated how beautiful Kara was in reality; it was all I could do to not hit on her, but as her mother was present, it would have been disrespectful, and the girl just went through a lot. I wasn't so insensitive…

Kara was a bubbly kind of girl, and she was kind of scary smart. She reminded me of Darcy-love, my lover, that I missed a lot. I had expected to meet a depressed kind of Kara Zor-El, for a moment it had seemed that she was there… but it looks like I butterflied her character growth by saving her family and civilization.

The young Kryptonian was curious about everything in the station and praised how Kryptonian and futuristic it looked when I showed her the public schematics on the PADD I've given her.

I couldn't help myself from saying, "That's normal, my AI created this space station from the wreck of Brainiac's ship; she used the technology of your people that we took as a prize from the servers on the skullship to model most of the systems combined with my own personal technology. We wanted for the people of Kandor -that we would release slowly into the station- to feel at home and know how everything works."

Nothing was said after that, the mother and daughter glanced at each other and then finally at me. I still thought that Kryptonian were telepathic, because the two women were having a silent conversation with each other that I couldn't hear or follow despite me being a telempath.

Alura stared into my eyes, her tone rather blunt. "Princess. Why us? I mean, I'm not an ingrate and am thankful that you saved my people… but why did you choose us, Kryptonians, to come into contact with, and not another species in the bottled cities collection?"

I laughed at the nervousness that I could feel from the woman. Then I showed a serious expression to explain myself. "It's easy to answer, Lady Alura; the answer is familiarity. I know almost everything about your people, but I don't know and understand some of the species Brainiac… collected."

"What do you plan to do with the other bottled cities?" Alura asked, understanding why I chose them. Tamaraneans had a fruitful alliance with Krypton in my universe before, they had been less expansionists but were almost nommed on by Galactus but because of a Phoenix Force host Krypton went kaboom when Rao went Nova. At least that's what little information Amora, my wife, had uncovered in the Librarium.

The Enchantress was always stuck here to read about the history of most extinct species; the last time I spoke to her she wanted us two to go on a treasure hunt for some artifact of powers. I would do so when I get back and after I fight Hela.

Looking intently at Alura, and started to tell her why I didn't free the bottled cities and the people trapped in it yet. "I fully intend to release all the other bottled cities, but…"

Then Alura facepalmed as she realized the problem. "You need to find viable planets for them first."

I nodded at her. "You understand, good."

The two female Kryptonian lowered their heads, understanding why I didn't just free everyone. I saved them, so I have a responsibility to see everyone under my aegis safe and cared for.

"Don't you possess terraforming technologies?" Kara asked, a curious expression etched onto her face.

Do I tell them about it? Should I obfuscate? Nah, it didn't matter that I told them about one of the most hax technologies I could command. I shrugged. "I actually do, but I can't access them currently. The tech that I possess, the Engines of Creation, would have allowed me to turn a bunch of dead planets into lush worlds or, depending on the species physiology, biospheres suited for them."

Kara chuckled, and joked, "Did you leave it in your original universe?"

I nodded seriously. "As a matter of fact, yes I did; I'm afraid that we'll have to do things with the local technology of this universe or use more exotic means to do this for everyone stuck in those bottles."

It was easy to see Alura and Kara think; Kryptonian brains were as powerful and fast as Tamaranean's. Alura asked me after pondering for a moment, "You're speaking about Quantum particle manipulation aren't you?"

Did she just call magic by a scientific name? Kryptonian are so silly… "Or something simpler and yet more powerful. Do you know what Element X is?"

It was so simple to get in this universe, and the Kryptonian didn't know it? That's surprising… Yet again, maybe the New Gods and the Presence don't want the information about the metal to be spread. I looked at Kara who shrugged her shoulders and hands in a 'I don't' know' gesture and said, "No idea."

"Is it some type of metal? What does it do?" Alura surmised as she analyzed the conversation in her head.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you." I said with a smirk.

"Try us." Kara declared before her mother could reply.

I feigned a heavy sigh. "Then I will start with something simpler… Do you know what Nth metal is?"

It was Alura who answered first. "Yes. It's a metal that can enable a being to control quantum particles to manipulate the fabric of reality, it has a lot of various effects on organic matter I must say. There's a lot of research done on it with the samples we obtained during the age of expansion."

Kara showed her lack of knowledge about the subject by looking between me and her mother. But this spared me from a long explanation about Thanagar. Alura's explanation simplified things, but… "Please just say that it's able to manipulate magic… I swear, since those teeny goblins -the Maltusian- often rob the universe of magic in most timelines, civilizations that only thrive on technology are born in your multiversal cluster."

Then I began to tell them the biggest crime of the Guardians of the universe, who had robbed this universe of magic. Three and a half billion years ago a humanoid race from the world of Maltus sought to bring order to the stars. An offshoot of the race became known as the Guardians of the Universe. When I said this, Kara's and her mother's expressions changed and looked shocked that I was accusing the Green Lantern's leaders; but I continued…

The Guardians sought to remove magic from the universe, and laid siege to the Magic Empire throughout the cosmos. The war was costly on both sides, but the Guardians won… After the wars, all the stray mystical energies in the universe were gathered and bound in an orb called the Starheart. This collective force was hidden in the heart of a star and grew in power and eventually gained self-awareness as the Green Flame of Life.

Next I tried to explain to them why this was a crime… Magic is a mystical force that flows in the universe like the Gravitational force, Weak Nuclear force, Electromagnetic force, Strong Nuclear force, the Speed force, the Emotional spectrum, the Sage and Strength force, and the Green which was parts of a lot of 'force' that governed over Life. Magic in particular was linked to creativity, imagination and odd components of the psyché. Then I spoke about the Wizard of Juru, an offshoot of Kryptonian who manipulated Magic and lived in the Valley of Juru.

They didn't exist anymore and became what was part of the Religious Guild who protected this part of Krypton's history; I revealed that yes… "Rao is real, and so are his children but I doubt they survived Krypton's loss now..."

"What you're saying is that the Guardians of the universe are not to be trusted?" Alura asked with a worried expression.

I made a so-so gesture. "I wouldn't, they don't protect anything and save nothing, they lord over the races less advanced than them. Why do you think they didn't intervene to save Krypton which is in sector 2813, basically near Earth which they keep an eye on because of the magic civilization and gods still living there? Was the Lantern late? Or did the Guardian delay giving him the information."

"How do you know this?"

I showed them my favorite bling, my power ring; my soft-suit which has been covering the ring, let it appear on my finger. "This ring came from a dead Green Lantern and has chosen me. MACHINA hacked the subpar technology of the guardians and now we have a connection to their archives and databases."

MACHINA beamed some files from the databases on their computing devices and showed them proof of what I've been saying. The Guardian knew that Brainiac was coming toward Krypton, but never warned them, and even delayed Tomar-Re the Lantern of sector 2813 from arriving in time to confront Brainiac.

I let them read through the files and reports I sent them for a moment. It was Kara who reacted badly to the information with a flaring temper. "This… how could they do this?!"

There was a lot of rage there from what I could sense, it started to turn into hatred. Fortunately, Alura put a hand on her daughter's arm and said, "Calm down, Kara."

"But mother…" Kara's eyes were full of tears, she was sad as well as enraged by what I showed her.

Alura glared down at Kara who slowly averted her eyes and said in a low whisper, "Shutting up, now."

Alura turned toward me and had a disapproving expression etched onto her face. "Princess, from what I remember, the Guardians have a council? Then it would be normal for them to have factionalism amongst them. We shouldn't paint all of them with the same brush, maybe the council is rife with bad apples who make bad decisions?"

I didn't have a comeback to that, Alura may very well be right. But from my Metaknowledge, I know the Guardians are mostly bad apples; with a few good ones in their council, at least three of them. With a nod I conceded to her argument. "You may be right Alura… but the only Malthusian that I could ever trust is Ganthet, in many universes he always leaves the Guardians council and found the Blue Lantern. He is the best of them."

Between, I wanted my Blue Lantern ring; I hope to be able to inspire Ganthet into leaving and make his own. We will see what happens when I go to Oa and start negotiating.

"You really know a lot…" Kara said as she stared at me, then with a look of suspicion she asked as she recalled this entire conversation, "Princess Komand'r…"

"Yes, Friend-Kara?" I automatically entered into dizzy Kori-mode at Kara's tone.

"You aren't from here are you?" The blonde young adult Kryptonian asked me with a meaningful glance.

"No, I wasn't born on this space station, Friend-Kara." I said as I cocked my head at her.

Kara's cheek reddened and she spluttered, "I mean… as in this universe!"

Alura laughed at her daughter as she understood that I maneuvered her into the joke. With a perking up expression, I said, "Ah! No, Friend-Kara. I am… from one multiversal cluster away, which is why I know a lot of things about this timeline. I observed them before coming here."

"You know about the future…?" Kara was really curious about that.

With an enigmatic smile I nodded. "Some of them. But you should know that nothing is ever written in stone, that's why I try to avoid time travel as much as I can; it always complicates things."

Like every other time travel related thing, you can change the future. For better or worse, if you killed Hitler, you don't know if the world would've been better or worse. Yes what Hitler did was horrible but him doing those acts kind of united other nations against him and other communist states. Time is a weird thing. The flash: flashpoint is a great example. Barry saving his mother, one person out of billions changed everything. Bruce died instead of his father, Aquaman and Wonder Woman were in a war, the Flash lost his powers, etc. all of that because one person didn't die.

Alura surprised me with her next sentence as she concluded, "Your explanation tells me that you've got technology to breach holes in the membranes supporting different universes, is this true?"

Her reasonment wasn't wrong exactly, I did breach some universal membrane to come here. In actuality, I was still doing it to project this avatar here in this universe. To reward her, I used my power ring and projected a light construct between us. "Think of your universe like a berry, there are fifty-two of them in a single grape. Each grape is part of its own bubble which is also part of its own grape system and so on."

I started with a bubble, attached to fifty-one others who were themselves in a single bubble; then it became a self perpetuating cycle that was projected from the ring. Until I stopped it here, then I looked back at Alura who had an astounded mien.

"Rao, it is endless!" She said, then she started taking notes furiously with her wrist computer.

"You get it, Lady Alura." Ah, scientists, they always do stuff like that.

You show them how things work and they start wanting for more; I guess that I sent Alura on a different science path just now. Knowing how smart she is, it wouldn't be difficult for her to be able to guess how to breach branes.

Continuing my explanation, I said, "The entity who gave me the technology I employ proved that there's an infinity of multiverses existing side by side with each other. It's called the Omniverse. Not all of them have the same properties; they often differ and are grouped by clusters. That is why there's different rules, metaphysics and physics that apply to them. As an example, some clusters are abundant in magic, or other kinds of exotic energy."

I'm looking at you, Chi, The Force, Spiritual Energy and the Lifestream! One day I will get you… Hmm, going to Star Wars would be fun.

Alura pulled me out of my train of thought. "So… You can come and go to other universes as much as you want then?"

I shook my head, and made a so-so gesture. "This depends on the energy available I'm afraid…. Though there's obviously more limitations involved. It's a complex process."

The Kryptonian scientist nodded, understanding what I meant. "Ah, one of the usual dilemmas of any new technology or theory, energy. Strange how every new breakthrough needs it."

We spoke more on the subject, while Kara was listening to us with rapt attention; as if she was taking in everything we said. I was not a scientist, but I could understand the technology of the ship builders and some of my gene mods conferred my near perfect memory and recall, as well as increased cognitive comprehension and speed. So I could follow what Alura and other scientists of her species were getting to or speaking about.

MACHINA chose that moment to say in alarm. Mom, there's trouble in Kandor.

*What's happening again?* I sighed.

Jor-El and his brother are looking for Alura and they can't find her; they gather in the council room at the Central Tower of Kandor.

It was finally time to go to Kandor myself, my soft-suit turned into a typical Tamaranean royal airy purple dress; it showed a lot of my body and skin, a silver circlet with a green gem completed my jewelry. Standing up, I noticed Alura and Kara looking at me with wonder. They didn't come up with the kind of technology making the soft-suit possible yet, but they were close.

Kryptonians from the 52nd universe have it. A silver cloak unfurled from my dress, completing my outfit. "Come friends, we're going to Kandor."

Kara jumped up from her bed. "Yes! We're going to see dad and the others!"

~/.\~

(Jor-El)

Council Chambers

Jor-El was worried, it wasn't like Alura to disappear like this. Also, it pained him that it was Lara who had to bring attention to this, proving once again that Zor-El and him were too absorbed in trying to fix the problem of Kandor being in a high-tech bottle. Even more so when it wasn't necessary anymore now that they were being taken care of by the Tamaranean princess.

The scientist didn't trust her, how could he? Suddenly declaring that she defeated Brainiac, a man who entire empires tried to fight? He felt deception there. Or is it? Wasn't it just his own hubris and hurt feelings that were making him see things? Jor-El had wanted it to be him, his son, niece or his brother to be the one to save this city and the remnants of their civilization. He had expressly sent Kara and Kal-El for that after all, to avenge them and free them once they won.

It had always been the plan.

He looked at his fellow councilors, they all sat around the round table in the informal council room where they were sure not to be recorded. All council matters were recorded now, to allow the citizens to review them later and be informed about their decisions or changes enacted. It was still a new system, but so far it seemed to satisfy the dissenters amongst the Kandorian population.

*It helped that MACHINA distributed all those resources to us.* Jor-El thought.

It was strange, he couldn't trust the Tamaranean Princess, but he could do so with the electronic being. She was open about everything she did for their people and her childish personality indicated that she wasn't old enough to be a truly malignant intelligence.

The man asked again, "Have any of you seen where my sister-in-law has gone?"

It was Floria Rall-Voth who answered first with an annoyed mien. "For the last time we don't."

"Do you suspect foul play, acting Counselor El?" Rak-An asked with disdain.

Jor-El ignored the man's tone, but still answered the question. "At this point, I can no longer dismiss anything."

The tracker that he put on every member of the El family and its branch out was supposed to give their location. But Alura was simply not here, she had disappeared for one day already. But this state of affairs wasn't to last, holograms in Kryptonese appeared at the entrance of the informal council room.

Here comes Princess Komand'r!

Vorp!

MACHINA was the first to appear from the maelstrom of dark and white blue light whirling into existence. Jor-El was the first to call out the name of the intelligence. "MACHINA?"

Exiting the portal was another being, this time it was a golden orange skinned woman; Jor-El recognized her, he had seen only holographic rendering of her before. She floated in the center of the room and landed gracefully on the marble floor. "Hello there, my friends."

All the councilors stood up from their seats, surprised by the arrival of someone who had once been a distant acquaintance. She wore a purple dress that showed a lot of skin; the Kryptonian scientist wasn't surprised, Tamaranean always wore this type of apparel to let more and more sunlight and ultraviolet light touch their body.

"Princess Komand'r?!" Councilor Rall-Voth called her name when she recognized who made an impressive entrance in the Kandorian council room.

"Ah, Friend Folria, I'm so happy to see you face to face."

Jor-El then observed that the portal wasn't closing, and lo and behold, Alura Zor-El exited it. He now understood the repercussions of Komand'r being able to join them in the bottled city and he didn't like it. His wife, Lara, had been right; there was no need for him to kill himself researching a way out, it already existed. *Rao, I'm really stubborn like a thought-beast.*

"Alura? You're back!" And of course Zor-El had to be here.

His brother let go of all thought and decorum and ran to his wife and hugged her. Relief etched onto his face as he kissed her, the tension in his body left him as he relaxed.

"Yes, I am Zor. And someone else is back with me…" Alura said comfortingly in the embrace of her husband.

Exiting the portal next was a girl wearing a blue bodysuit with a red-skirt integrated with it. On the dark blue bodysuit, red stripes on the flanks came to form the symbol of House encased in a traditional shield. Her long blonde hair floated in the air as she moved. Jor-El's eyes widened as he recognized her. "KARA?!"

She looked just like the last time he had seen her on that fateful day; she looked young, barely eighteen cycles.

"Father!" The girl turned into a blue and red missile aimed at Zor-El who was still holding his wife.

Kara was fortunately stopped by the Princess who just caught her with a hand on her shoulder. This surprised Jor as he understood the control and the power needed by Komand'r made her stronger than he expected. *Her having killed Brainiac should be true if she had so much control of her body.*

"Kara! My little flame-bird!" Zor-El exclaimed, his face full of delighted surprise.

While the reunion was going on, the Princess floated toward Counselor Rall-Voth that she seemed to fancy a lot by how much the two were touching each other. Jor had never understood why the Tamaraneans were so touchy feely.

"Your Highness, why have you come?" The brown skinned redhead had a blush on her face as she asked this.

Jor noticed how Kara seemed to glare at the Labor Guild councilor, he asked himself why? He doubted that Kara knew the woman, and Rall-Voth was one of Alura's allies on the council; the girl shouldn't have- Ah. *Does she have feelings for the Princess?*

Princess Komand'r held onto Counselor Rall-Voth's hand and started to answer with candor, "I've come to decide a number of things with you Kryptonians; I cannot in good conscience keep you uninformed of what's happening outside of Kandor. And I have plans concerning you all, I wish for some of your people to fill up some positions inside the Mobile Space Station Odyssey. Lady Alura was made privy of my designs when we went to fetch Kara."

Kara was still glaring at the linked hand of Komand'r and Rall-Voth. Her mother hit her on the back of the head. "Ouch."

The Labor Guild councilor smiled at this revelation. "I bet it's an adventure."

"Believe me, it was." Alura piped up as she was fiddling with her wrist computer.

Jor-El's own computer chimed, a stream of data filtered to his own server at home; Kelex was already indexing Alura's notes and data. The caretaker android transmitted the footnotes and Jor-El's eyes fell back on Alura in shock. The blonde stared at him meaningfully, then she looked at Komand'r. *Another universe with people more advanced than us taking an interest into our situation? Why? Are they trying to bring the Kryptonians back from extinction for a reason?*

"Some of us will be able to exit the city, then?" Rall-Voth was simply ecstatic as she guessed that they would be able to exit this damned bottled city.

Komand'r smiled and nodded. "That is the plan, Friend Folria; I wish for a pool of your best engineers, doctors, scientists, soldiers and pilots to join us. Things are… getting difficult outside."

Jor-El listened more attentively, if his cards were played right… "Lara and I will be able to…move outside."

For the first time since Jor met her, Komand'r turned toward him, walked midway toward him and stopped. Her face betrayed her emotion, there was some awkwardness there and… sadness. "Yes, I want chief scientist Jor-El and Lady Lara to be out there, there's a personal matter concerning them on Earth."

Time stopped for Jor, his heart sank and quickly understood the implication. "Something happened to Kal?"

The Princess nodded, it also soothed his ego that the overly competent Tamaranean royal needed him to resolve trouble. "Yes, Lord El. And We really need your know-how to resolve the situation."

Jor-El looked at Kara, who lowered her eyes when she felt his gaze on her. There was shame here, and as she looked at her boots, Jor-El realized that Kara must have failed to be with her cousin. Actually she looked just out of hypersleep, she was still as young as he remembered. "If Kara wasn't with him…"

Kara had the mission to teach Kal in their way and to protect him; Jor and Zor had given them everything to start a small colony with their descendants, there was a birth Matrix in the home with the data cache and technology he prepared for them. They should have already procreated and have dozens of kids to bring back their species from extinction. With the use of the Birth Matrix, blood relations between the two donors didn't matter, offspring are born without defects or genetic illnesses.

Then Jor saw Kara move toward Komand'r and the Princess automatically wrapped her in a one armed hug; the expression on the girl's face brightened and it was at this point that Jor didn't take Kara's sexual preference into account in his plans. The princess kissed the girl's left brow and then looked around herself and said, "Let's discuss this over some snack; MACHINA, bring the buffet."

Complying…

In flashes of blue light the round table found itself laden with vittles of all sorts with pitchers full of different colored liquid. Jor-El walked up to her and said, "Please tell me-"

The doors to the informal council room opened, and a woman in black and gold dress arrived; she was as beautiful as ever, but she looked martial and like a no-nonsense woman with blue glacier for eyes.

Her eyes focused on Kara and the Princess; as she walked toward them her voice rang in the room. "What happened to my son?"

Lara was finally here and she didn't look happy…