Superman: The Ark of Krypton
Chapter 133
By
Jason Richard
The three Colu Spheres began shooting that same energy that locked Superman into slowed time, which Superman dodged as best he could, but all three of them had time acceleration fields around them, allowing them to track his movements. Superman hated to admit it, but he was on the defensive here.
He kept moving to a sphere to punch it backward, keeping it from its course towards Earth, but he couldn't fight these probes and stop the Colu ship. As he punched the spheres the ship altered its course to go around them.
After managing to punch all the spheres backward in rapid succession Superman tried to go for the ship to slow it down, but the spheres cut him off immediately. Furthermore, another sphere left the ship and began heading towards Earth at high speed. There was no way Superman could get to it on time.
Superman didn't know if it was fortunate or unfortunate that a certain person came to help right at that moment.
A wave of electromagnetic energy blasted the spheres and knocked them out. Superman looked over to see a giant robot with rockets on its feet and weapons coming out of everywhere else.
"Superman," said Lex Luthor's voice from the robot. "It seems we'll be working together on this particular venture."
"Lovely," said Superman dryly. "Well, think you can hold off those probes while I slow down the ship?"
And indeed the probes were turning back on as they spoke.
"I believe that is within this unit's capabilities," said Luthor. "Good luck."
His word's said good luck, but his tone was dripping with sinister intent.
"Thanks," said Superman, flying off. If it protected the Earth, then he'd live with this arrangement.
…
"It's already been attempted I'm afraid," said Brainiac's probe. "The Jiaxi tried a cybernetic virus fifty years ago. I'm afraid every one of these ideas has been attempted, and none have been successful."
Lytener grunted in frustrated and said, "That's the impression I was getting from the data. The trouble is that the list of tactics and technologies you sent us that are effective are beyond anything we can build here on Earth. Can you build any of this on the Ark of Krypton?"
"Yes," said Brainiac. "But unfortunately, I couldn't build enough of it for the craft approaching."
"Could you upgrade the technology that we already have?" asked Eliza Danvers.
"I'm afraid not," said Brainiac. "Not to the extent that would be necessary."
Everyone looked at their respective computer screens and felt deflated. This was getting them nowhere. There was always the hope that Superman could win without their help, but given what they knew of his abilities compared to the technology they were seeing it was becoming a faint hope.
"Brainiac," said Jeremiah Danvers. "How did the Kryptonians fight the Colu?"
"A combination of two factors," said Brainiac. "Comparable technology and equal numbers, neither of which we have. The Ark of Krypton, while Kryptonian in origin, was never intended as a battleship, and only includes rudimentary defenses to facilitate quick escapes."
"Okay," said Jeremiah. "What about this? The Colu have hundreds of pieces of technology stolen from hundreds of worlds. They can't all be 100% compatible with each other, can they? Is there some way we could turn some of their systems against each other?"
"Such things have already been tried..." began Brainiac, but Kara interrupted him with a sudden thought.
"They have," said Kara, getting excited. "But that's mostly been through direct means. Computer viruses, energy pulses, nanite weapons, things intended to activate those systems from the outside. I don't think anyone's tried to activate them internally"
"How do you mean Kara?" asked Eliza.
"What if," said Kara. "We went ahead and built and upgraded as many pieces of technology as we could, forget size and not worry about how many we have. If we use something the Colu's systems will automatically activate countermeasures against it. However, if we use the right combination of attacks at the same time the automatic countermeasures for one piece of technology may interfere with the countermeasures for another."
Brainiac took a moment to process his data.
"To my knowledge," said Brainiac. "No such method has been attempted before. I should point out that the Colu no doubt have measures in place to make certain their systems do not conflict in this manners."
"True," said Jeremiah Danvers. "But the more complicated a system the more chances there are for mistakes and glitches, and with that many types of technology this is probably one of the most complicated systems in the universe."
"The biological nature of their technology complicates that though," said Eliza. "There are plenty of systems that work in nature that we cannot replicate with technology. Finding combinations like the one's Kara suggests isn't going to be easy. Still, it sounds like a good a place to start as any."
"So we're agreed?" asked Lytener. "We try Kara's plan."
Everyone nodded.
"Alright then," said Lytener. "Let's get started then."