Jor-El's mind fought against his failing body as he struggled to hold onto fleeting moments of consciousness, battling to contain the waves of nausea that threatened to overwhelm him. The three dimensional holographic display was painted red with flashing warning glyphs. Systems were failing across the Star-ship, the klaxon alarm accompanied the worst news, punching his already pounding head with the piercing warning sound.
"Off." Jor-El spat, as he pulled his head forward from the pilots chair, raising his arm to interface with the hologram control surface.
"Structural Integrity compromised." The feminine voice intoned in ancient Kryptonian, her clipped accent from the bygone era of Emperors officious, a legacy of the old Martial era. "Time to structural collapse estimated at five minutes."
"Time to destination."
"Six minutes."
Jor-El swiped his hand across the display. There had to be an answer, or in five minutes he'd be dead.
For him it seemed that less time than that had passed since he entered this relic of the former space fairing age.
His father had arranged for the relevant permissions. Jor-El senior indulged his sons many interests, taking pride in his multidisciplinary achievements. Proud, a son of the House of El was adding to the august scientific achievements of their noble family. The opportunity to excavate such an ancient and yet unrecorded colonisation era site was an honour. That such sites still existed undisturbed was testament to the vast size of their home world. Krypton was as large as a rocky planet could reasonably expect to be, in orbit around a red dwarf star. Beside vast real estate this world came with little else to recommend it. Primal, hostile and untamed when Kryp and Ton had founded the first colony, their story had been instrumental in reuniting the two houses of humanity, and bringing about an era of peace, a retreat from Empire.
In the intervening centuries Krypton had been tamed and made beautiful.
Jor-El searched for an answer.
Images appeared from the moment the dormant systems had been reactivated. He watched as in one 3D cube his own archaeological droids sifted the earth at speed a grain at a time, revealing the Kryptonian Metal of the lost space craft. In another he saw his own face speckled by sweat and dirt, as he worked alongside the machines, filling with surprise and wonder as the portal into the metal cylinder opened.
From a third came his voice "The discovery of a lifetime." He spoke to the record, for posterity.
With hindsight as he faced death, Jor-El also recognised in his own excited features the hunger of youth, and the fear of being denied by his elders, the Science Council, carry him inside.
"Not since space travel was outlawed and our fleet dismantled during the colonisation, has a Kryptonian stood in the metal of a space vessel." He said for the recording.
"As you see" He continued. "The craft is in a remarkable state of preservation."
Jor-El observed how he had scanned the corridors, walking the short distance from his point of entry to the cockpit. "It appears that structural modifications have been made to accommodate phased sectional force fields."
"Theorem." He stated. "It would appear the intention was to reinforce the ship."
His father's voice had interrupted his foray inside. Speaking over the communication net "Jor" His Father barked. "Be careful." I've reviewed your latest data, and I'm calling our legal representative, before I notify the Science Council. Antique it maybe; any and all space travel is prohibited. That a space craft has survived – hidden likes this, deliberately..."
Entering the cockpit Jor-El replied interrupting his Father. "I believe someone modified this vessel shortly after colonisation." He told him whilst forwarding his scan results to his home.
"I concur. They must have intended to attempt a launch" The older man replied, his interest piqued. "However even with internal shields to reinforce the super-structure achieving escape velocity from Krypton's gravity would tear the craft apart – and kill the occupants. Our ancestors chose Krypton for a good reason."
"It was a one way trip." Jor-El replied as he eased himself into the Pilots seat. "I will attempt to review the ships log; perhaps more information will be forthcoming."
"Jor..."
It was the last words the youth remembered. Now the replaying of the ships recordings explained what happened next.
Jor-El by activating the dormant command system had triggered a pre-existing flight program.
In his last minutes he reviewed the data.
The launch had pinned him to the seat, severed his data link, and moments later he had lost consciousness. All the while an ancient flight plan had been implemented by the ship.
The launch had almost killed him. That much he was certain
"To come so far, to fall so near." He mused. He was equally sure he was going die in space just one minute from a safe harbour, as the old space craft broke up around him in sight of a habitable world.
Another voice this time from the distant past "By reinforcing the hull, and by the addition of extra engines I retrieved from our landing craft, I believe I can achieve escape velocity, so I can escape this radioactive hell."
The Kryptonian called Cor-Nel had identified a better kinder world.
The playback indicated much skipped time, and the next recording Cor-Nel said. "We're adapting slowly to the high gravity, the medical division continuing to roll out enhancements, I managed a four hour day yesterday before becoming exhausted. Rao only knows what would have happened to our natural ancestors had they come to this world before our races managed evolution, crushed flat I would estimate. A race of super-people made weak by gravity. Krypton our self-imposed punishment."
Jor-El flipped forward.
Cor-Nel continued "I estimate I need to wait at least another six months before I risk a launch, even with the new enhancements from the medical corps, and exhaustive training, the extra gravitational-compensators turned up to over 9000, I'm still too weak to survive the launch."
Generations later I was strong enough Jor-El thought to himself but the ship wasn't, perhaps Cor-Nel had gotten his sums wrong, Jor-El wondered, perhaps it was the ship's advanced age, but she had been broken escaping Krypton's gravitational pull. Only the space warping engines had saved her, bending space around the ship as it crossed light years of space to the pre-programmed destination.
Now as the ship progressed in normal space it was simply falling apart.
Jor-El sighed it seemed that was last recording. Then he saw another file.
It was tiny, text only record.
"Installation of escape pod, manual, and details"
The young scientist smiled there was still hope. He tapped the S like glyph on his chest.
Silas stone sighed deeply.
"Silas you must come, look, see."
He turned to look up at the earnest face of his friend Saul Erdel. His hair wild and unkempt like a parody of a mad scientist. His hands shaking like an excited child gesturing for him to follow.
"What now." Stone put down his pen, on the pad of paper was a complex set of equations.
His own dark curls were cropped short.
STAR Labs - Scientific and Technological Advanced Research – Laboratories gave both men unprecedented opportunity, resources and equipment to push the boundaries of science.
"I have found something." Saul said excited.
Silas frowned, but walked over to his friends CRT monitor, the green screen showed the data feed from a radio telescope array, many miles from Metropolis.
"See." Erdel exclaimed. "It appeared moments ago."
Silas frowned. The data was there, Saul was correct - an object was travelling at unparalleled speed towards Earth.
Together they watched as minutes later the unknown's trajectory altered.
Erdel crunched the numbers. "My God." Saul whispered. "It's just crashed into the Moon."
Jor-El watched the ancient Kryptonian Battle Cruiser slammed into the dark side of this blue green worlds only natural satellite. Things had changed a lot since Cor-Nel's day. Data from the escape vehicles limited sensor array indicated the world had placed artificial objects in orbit, communication arrays judging from the chatter. Fortunately the military standard escape pod came with stealth capabilities, and judging from the initial data on his screen these would be more than sufficient to mask his descent. It seemed the Planet had developed rudimentary technology at best. Reviewing their broadcasts Jor-El was puzzled by the inhabitant's appearance, they looked Kryptonian.
Cor-Nel had chosen this world for this reason he decided. How this could be, was a mystery.
Jor-El's descent took him to the smaller of the two northern land masses. Ocean as he thought of her, was two thirds water. Jor ran the various broadcasts on radio frequencies through the on-board computer. He hoped to gain a working understanding of the language. No he corrected himself languages, he directed the AI to concentrate on the local dialect of the area where the pod was due to descend. Next he determined where he should land. There were several large urban centres, sources for materials, and a means for him to return home.
One of these would be an obvious place to start.
With no current information to work from Jor-El chose the large conurbation towards the centre of the Northern landmass.
He checked the local radio broadcasts; the AI extrapolated the name of the city from them using a smart algorithm.
He directed the cloaked pod to land in the countryside beyond this alien place.
"Gotham." Jor-El said, practising the strange word, as the invisible ship crossed the dark spires of the old town to its destination.