Jor-El looked through the telescope at the blue, brown, green, and white planet that was swirled together like a beautiful little marble. He sighed because it wasn't beautiful at all when you got a closer look at it.

"It's the perfect planet," he told Lara who stood at his side. "He will not only survive there, but he will thrive there. Their yellow sun will make him one of the most powerful beings in the universe. I will send a crystal in his ship that will expand into a palace and begin a cloning process, so he will have people to care for him and teach him our ways."

She looked crestfallen. "Clones? It's not inhabited?"

"It is," he said, "by people who look just like us, but they are not fit to raise our child."

"I'd rather hoped he'd have an adopted mother and father to love him. We can make copies of ourselves using our DNA, but you know it's not the same thing. Clones are variable, unpredictable."

"I know, but I believe we've worked out most of the bugs that come with cloning. If you only saw the alternative, you haven't seen what I've seen, Lara. I've been among these people. The wars they have far surpass our own. The violence that happens on a day to day basis, it's astronomical."

"You believe they would try to hurt him?" she asked, going over to the crib and stroking Kal-El's very soft black curls as she watched him sleep.

"I believe they are capable of anything. There are places that are uninhabitable to them on their planet. So cold that only the hardiest of animals survive it of which the humans of Earth are not one of them. The crystal we use would make it camouflage against the landscape. He would grow up in relative peace."

Another quake rocked their world, bringing the conversation to a halt. They had to put all their energies into finishing the rocket before it was too late.

As she comforted her crying child, woken by the abrupt shaking, she wondered what kind of fate they were sending him to. Would the palace be a home or a prison for him? Would the loneliness be too much to bear and what kind of man would he become with such an upbringing?

sss

The pounding on the door was so impatient that Lois wondered if it wasn't bill collectors at the door.

It was her father. She should have known. "Is it Christmas already?"

"Funny," he said in full military dress right down to his metals. "Can I come in?"

"Sure," she said, moving out of the way so that he could come into her small apartment.

He wasn't forthcoming about the reason for his visit. He stood there looking around as if she were one of his soldiers and this was an inspection.

"Seriously, why are you here?" she asked.

"Can't a man visit his daughter?"

"A man can, but you're not most men. How long are you here for?"

"I do have a short errand to run. I thought we could catch up. I could run my errand, spend the night, and we could go out for breakfast in the morning before I have to leave."

"Translation: you're on a mission, and you don't want to tell the nosy reporter what it is."

"I didn't say that."

"You didn't have to," she said with a grin going into the kitchen to get him a black coffee.

"Mmm," he said after he'd taken a sip. "For a girl who doesn't know how to cook, you sure do make a good cup of joe."

"You're not even going to give me a little teeny, tiny hint what you're up to?" she asked as she nursed her own mug.

"It's classified. If it becomes unclassified, you'll be the first to know, I promise."

She supposed she would have to be satisfied with that for now, but she had a feeling he was sitting on something big, something life-changing.