The snipers were the last of the stragglers, and while Zod holds no illusions that they will be the last intruders, for now they can return to the farm.

Kal-El awaits them at the edge of the property, and the boy seems agitated.

"Was that really necessary?" are the first words out of his mouth.

Zod raises an eyebrow.

"Perhaps not, they had no prospect of harming anything but the local structures and inhabitants, after all." The general gestures dismissively at the Kent farm. "But I would rather remove an irritant than let it grow into a threat – wouldn't you?"

Unwilling to get into a lengthy argument with the younger El, Zod brushes past the boy on his way to the main building – and just barely catches a flicker in Kal's eyes. For a split-second, they seem to shine a bright red before they turn back to normal. How curious.

"They wouldn't shoot at their own people!" the boy snaps then, proving his inexperience once more.

"Collateral damage," Zod explains patiently. "Any projectile or explosion that rebounds from the shuttle will hit part of this farm."

Before Kal can argue anything else, the general sends him to do something useful. "Ask Lara Lor-Van to meet us out here for a moment, will you?"

The boy opens his mouth for some sort of defiant retort, but then merely scowls and obeys.

Lara raises a half curious, half censorious eyebrow at the tableau that greets her, but does as told when Zod asks her to take a look at the injured human. The order gains the general suspicious looks from Hardy – somewhat understandable, Zod supposes – and incredulous ones from Kal – less understandable, just what did the boy expect?

"What happened?" Lara asks while she scans the human's shoulders and the general is halfway through the explanation before the human's scowl and the boy's confused frown make him realize that both question and answer haven't been in the local language. And, of course, Kal is not yet fluent in his own mother tongue.

The latter is not Zod's problem, thankfully, and so he just continues his report. Lara hums thoughtfully once he is finished and then turns towards Hardy.

"I am not yet able to make sense of all the local idioms, I'm afraid," she says politely. "So, what exactly is a lab rat in the context of conversation, Colonel Hardy? How do people turn into one when you talk to them?"

The human soldier sputters and Kal goes unexpectedly tense.

"A lab rat?" the boy repeats. "A lab rat is a small animal used for experiments."

It's Lara's turn to frown confusedly. "What kind of experiments?"

Kal shrugs, clearly ill at ease. "All kinds. Usually not very comfortable or outright fatal for the rat."

Lara stares for a moment, first at her son and then at Hardy.

"Obviously you do things very differently here!" she hisses then, tone so heavily resonant with Science Offended! that Hardy, who has faced dismemberment undaunted, leans as far away from her as he can get.

Lara slaps the last of the medical pads on the human with a little more than necessary force, and then storms off towards the main house of the farm.

Hardy waits until the door has swung closed behind her before he asks, "Who was that?"

Kal sends him a defensive glare.

"My mother," he says flatly.

The human soldier stares at him for a few seconds, and then mutters, "Oh, that explains so much."

The boy predictably bristles. "What's that supposed to mean?!"

"Woman like that misplaces her kid," Hardy explains, "I'm not surprised to find her raising an invasion army to get him back."

Which, while factually incorrect, is an eerily accurate description of Lara's disposition, Zod finds.

SZSZSZSZSZSZS

When the door reopens a minute later, Hardy tenses at first, but the female leaving the house is not an irate scientist but Kal's woman, followed closely by Mrs. Kent. Given the identical looks of exasperation the two women wear, Zod considers the human soldier's relaxation at the sight to be premature.

"You have been watching too many midnight movies, young man," the older woman starts, "if 'visited by aliens' immediately makes you think 'invasive procedures.' I assure you, Colonel Hardy, all they did is eat pie and talk motorcycles with my husband."

The colonel opens his mouth, but before he can say anything, Kal's woman jumps in with, "It's true, Hardy. Everyone was on their best behavior, even the good general here."

She nods at Zod with an insouciance he would take offence at, if she wasn't so obviously winding up the human colonel. Indeed, her tone becomes pure challenge when she adds, "And if you think I'd be easier to shut up for him than for you or Swanwick …."

"He can take a whole planet hostage and make it stick!" Hardy snaps back. "So, …."

Slight, elderly and a farmer, Mrs. Kent clears her throat with enough emphasis to cut through the nascent tirade.

"Please excuse us for a moment, General," she says politely, and then steps down from the porch, grabs the human soldier by the arm and drags the man – easily half again her weight and most of that muscle – off to the side.

Zod, Kal and his woman watch them go with various expressions of bemusement.

For the two Kryptonians, the expression morphs into a smirk soon enough, when Mrs. Kent proceeds give Hardy a thorough dressing-down, starting with the words, "Let me set a few things straight, …" once they are out of human earshot.

"Does Hardy know that the two of you can still hear them, easily?" Kal's woman asks after a few seconds. "I mean, he knows that you can see through walls, Clark, but did hearing ever come up?"

The boy shrugs. Zod doesn't bother with an answer. He is too busy wondering what it will take to ensure that Faora-Ul will never meet Mrs. Kent. The latter seems to be getting along well with Lara, and the thought of all three women ganging up is scarier than the general is willing to admit.