General Lane held up the crystal, and it caught the sunlight. "What does it do?"
"I don't know," he answered truthfully.
"Months and months of the top scientists in the country working on it and nothing. It's as impenetrable as your ship was, so here. Crack the code." He thrust it at him.
He looked at it, but what was he supposed to do with it?
It grew warm in his hands, and freaking out, he threw it into the empty field where they were going to build more barracks. The crystal inserted itself into the ground and began growing and multiplying until it could have been called a fortress in and of itself, a fort within a fort.
"What in the Sam Hill?" the general said in shock.
He was thinking the same thing.
General Lane ushered him toward it. "Find out what it is."
It was silly, his fear. His biological parents had saved his life by sending him to Earth. They wouldn't have given him something dangerous. He took a deep breath and went inside.
He jumped when he heard a voice, the same voice that had emanated from the ship.
"Your training begins, my son. You are Kal-El from the house of El. This is our crest." An image that looked rather like an "s" appeared like a hologram from a Star Wars movie. "The symbol means hope."
He liked that, hope. Even with the general glowering at him as if he'd been sitting on this information since he arrived, he did feel a surge of hope. As the military learned about his origins with him, maybe they'd finally stop seeing him as so inhuman.
sss
His prediction proved at least partially true. General Lane had relaxed considerably when Jor-El, for that was his father's name he'd learned, had said that he was to be a beacon of hope for humanity, to help and serve them. He wasn't free to leave the base yet, but he did have free reign of it now. Yet, it was his personal fortress that he kept returning to.
He was so lost in thought that he didn't hear her come in until she was right beside him, startling him.
She laughed. "How is it that someone with super-hearing can't hear me until I'm on top of him?"
He laughed. "I don't listen to everything at once. That would drive a person insane."
"I guess it would, wouldn't it?" She admired the beauty of the crystalline structure. "This place is amazing."
"Yeah," he agreed. It had been his salvation really.
"I mean I knew you were an alien. I saw you demonstrating your powers twice now, but this makes it real, doesn't it?"
"I suppose so." That was the part of it he didn't like so much. One more way he was different, separate from everyone else.
She was fascinated by it though, intrigued, as if being alien was part of the beauty. He wished he could see it through her eyes.
"You look very pretty by the way." And she did in a purple-blue sweetheart dress with rhinestone clips in her hair.
"Thanks," she said though she didn't look as if she entirely believed it. "I feel really awkward. I don't wear a dress and heels often, but you only have prom once, right? Oh, Kal-El, I'm sorry," she said, realizing the insensitivity of the comment.
He shrugged. "I've got two left feet anyway. I don't think I would've missed it. So who's the lucky guy you're going with?"
"Private Luthor," she said with a wry grin.
"You're going to prom with Private Luthor?" He felt fortunate he hadn't been holding onto anything as it probably would have crumbled in his hands. He didn't know why he was asking her again. It'd hurt enough the first time he'd heard it.
"Yeah, though he's asked me to call him Alex. Saves me some trouble. My dad's always sending a military escort to my dances. He's afraid I'm going to drink like a fish and wind up knocked up, so I thought I'd save him the trouble and take a military escort as my date this time."
He relaxed, knowing it wasn't romantic interest she had in him though he knew he didn't have a shot as things stood. "You know where you're going to college?"
"Yeah, Met U. I'm thinking of majoring in journalism. Maybe minoring in criminal studies."
"That sounds up your alley," he agreed. "Me, I guess this will be my studies. I'm learning Kryptonian or Kryptonese, whatever you want to call it. Can you believe it?"
"That's pretty cool. You'll be the only one who can speak it, your own private language."
"Well, some of the officers are learning it too, but that might not be so bad. It'll be like the Navajo language all over again if there's ever another worldwide war."
"Let's hope not. You know if you want my opinion, your story needs to be told. It's the unknown that scares people. The more they know about you, the less it'll scare them."
"That's reasonable." She made good sense, but after so many years of keeping what he could do and where he came from a secret, the thought terrified him.
"And the military can't cover you up if you're not a secret anymore."
"Also true."
It was like an electric jolt through him when she playfully slipped an arm through his. "Just promise me if you do decide to go public and I turn out to be a famous reporter, you'll give me your first exclusive."
"I promise."