Kansas – Metropolis – Precious Angels Children's Hospice – November 30, 2025

Ark sat at a desk in the little used physical therapy room. She had real clothes on and had taken on the persona Elena Ivanov again. Elena thus far has been several different people over the years when she had cause to interact directly with the Earthlings. As their civilization had advanced into the computer age it had become easier and easier to create an ID. Their computers were unsophisticated, and their security was laughable to a self-aware supercomputer. As the years had gone on, she had evolved her body to the point where her processing power riveled the computer core of her ship. Tahrao-Ju had no idea she had left the ship's core and was now free to roam. He would be livid if he'd realized but he was also powerless stuck in a data crystal as he was. She smiled when she saw the wheelchairs roll up. Today Elena had brown hair and brown eyes and different features. She'd used genetic scans of a few different people she ran into to form a new appearance. She did not have Kara Zor-El's face at the moment. Though she did favor it.

"Good morning girls. I'm Doctor Ivanov, but you can call me Elena."

Ark looked at her daughter's face the one she had crafted lovingly with the best genes krypton had to offer. She rarely felt pride in her work, but this truly was an occasion. She had been waiting for a long time to meet her child. She reached her hand out to Amber.

"You must be Amber."

Amber took her hand and shook it.

"And you are April."

April nodded and shook her hand as well. Ark lowed herself to meet them eye to eye.

"Okay girls, you have a lot of hard work before you if you want to walk. But when we're done you'll be running instead of having wheel chair races in the halls"

The girls looked at each other and blushed.

"Yes, I heard about that. This is a long hard road. You will have failures and you will get frustrated but if you can just push past that you'll be on your feet in no time. April you're going to be working with Aaron. Amber I'll be working with you. Well let's see what we're working with hmm?"

Ark stood and took the handles of Amber's wheelchair and pushed her into the therapy room. April blushed as soon as she saw Aaron. He was cute. He had short brown hair, a handsome face and was athletic looking. He winked at her and wheeled her into a separate room. Ark lifted Amber out of her chair and onto the bed in the room.

"Okay Amber, first step here and just to get your legs used to moving."

Ark started to manipulate Amber's legs bending them at the knee.

"How does that feel Amber?"

"Weird."

Ark laughed.

"How so?"

"I uh…nevermind."

Ark shrugged and continued to manipulate Amber's leg.

"Your leg muscles seem fine."

"I just don't…umm remember how to walk."

Ark quirked an eyebrow.

"Yet you remember how to speak English?"

"I think, I think maybe my legs didn't work before."

"You think so hmm? Why would you think that?"

"They feel weird, like I shouldn't have them."

"Your past does not matter, only your future. You have working legs now."

Amber looked up at Ark.

"I remember a saying: Whoever ignores the past is doomed to repeat it."

"And a philosopher once said: The past is a stone that will drown you."

Amber took Ark's hand and pulled herself up. She found herself holding two wooden poles. Her upper body strength was much better than it used to be. Maybe it was the BMC treatments.

"You are doing well. If you feel comfortable move one foot forward. Just slide it along the floor."

Amber shifted her foot slightly. Her legs weren't weak. She felt like should stand on them if she tried but she had no sense of balance. When she released the wooden poles, she collapsed. Ark pulled her up. Amber was slightly surprised at how easily Ark did it.

"Hold onto the poles Amber. You are not ready to try without them. You are smarter then that."

"Yes, ma'am."

Kansas – Smallville – Kent Farm – September 20, 1971

"But dad, I can control myself."

"A lot can happen on the field son. Emotions can get the better of you and suddenly you hurt someone."

Clark crossed his arms.

"You never let me do anything!"

Emma touched Clark's shoulder.

"Dad's right. You remember when Keith got a bit too forward with me at crater lake?"

Clark looked back at his little sister.

"That was different. No one trusts me here!"

Jonathan looked down at Clark.

"I trust you son. But you're a teenage boy. Sometimes you don't think before you act."

Clark vanished suddenly. Jonathan sighed. Emma waited until her father went back into the house. She went to the barn. She knew that's where she'd find her brother. She walked up the stairs to their hideaway. Clark glared at her.

"Clark?"

"Go away."

"No. You can't just run away from dad like that. Just because you can. Its rude."

"No rude is not letting me play football!"

"He's just trying to protect you."

"I'm bullet proof."

"But everyone else isn't. You can't just take back hurting someone."

"What would you know about that?"

"You remember what happened to Mike Tanner?"

Clark looked at Emma.

"You didn't do that did you?"

Emma nodded.

"He only got away with it because he used one of those meteor rocks."

"Emma, you broke his knee."

"I'd do it again if anyone else hurts you. Doesn't mean it feels right when I remember it."

Clark sat down in the old couch they had stuffed up here looking at his sister in a new light.

"I… can't believe you did that."

"I will always have your back."

"You shouldn't hurt people."

"And neither should you, that is why you can't play sports."

Clark sighed and nodded.

Kansas – Metropolis – Precious Angels Children's Hospice – November 31, 2025

Kristen, now Amber woke for the third day since her coma. The sun was streaming through her room's curtains. Part of her was hoping when she woke up next, she would be back in her old body her mother waking her up for school. She looked at her fingers moving each in turn. She turned her hands over looking at the flawless skin. They were so different from the blobs of twisted flesh her poor eyesight had revealed before this change. One of the nurses appeared and helped her out of the bed and into her wheelchair.

"It will be a few minutes before breakfast."

Amber nodded and wheeled her chair to the window. The window had a layer of frost along the bottom. She looked out at the falling snow. Amber hesitantly reached out and touched the glass and snapped her hand back. This was only the second time she'd actually seen snow she had needed touch the glass to tell her brain it was cold outside. She heard a voice behind her and looked back. It was the same nurse who had helped her out of bed.

"Old building, old windows. Are you ready to go to breakfast?"

Amber nodded, the food here was a shadow of her mothers, but as she had told April the day before, she should be thankful to be somewhere safe and to have food at all. Truth be told she had a lot to be thankful, starting with the fact she was alive. Waking up without pain another. None of that made up for the loss of her family, or Eric. Since she had lied about her memory, she couldn't tell anyone about her loss and that seemed to make it all the worse. Not that she wanted to admit what she believed happened to anyone, even herself. April smiled when she saw Amber appear. The nurse parked Amber beside her.

"Heya Amber!"

"Good morning, April."

"Looking forward to school today?"

"School?"

"It's Monday."

"Oh."

"Didn't think you were going to get away without school, did you?"

Amber smiled at her friend's words.

"I thought maybe."

April laughed.

Kansas – Smallville – Smallville High – June 15, 1974

Ark had taken on the appearance of random woman she'd seen dead a morgue average looking, brown hair and brown eyes. She went by the name Terri Parrish currently. For six years she had taught Math at Smallville High School. She'd watched Kal-El grow from child to adult. Guided him where his human parents failed. Saved him when he was almost outed by an overeager Metropolis police detective and several metahumans along with a sadistic Kryptonian supercomputer. Not that Kal-El, or Clark as he called himself had the faintest clue of what she had done for him. How she longed for him to look at her with the same eyes he looked at the human Martha Kent. The eyes of a son to his mother. Today he was having a crisis of conscience. It was his first kill. Not that he had killed the metahuman. That had been Ark. He knew Kal-El's secret and had to be dealt with. She did it gladly for the boy she saw as her son. The pair were walking along the sidelines of the school's football field.

"Ms. Parrish… I didn't mean to do it."

She looked at the pain her charge's eyes and frowned.

"You didn't do it. I did."

"How? Why?"

Clark blinked at her.

"Because I knew you would not, Kal-El. And it needed to be done."

Clark tripped over his feet and almost fell down. Ark caught his arm and he looked up at her.

"Why did you call me that?"

"Because it is your birth name."

He stared at her for a moment and his eyes went wide.

"You're like Brainiac!"

"Yes. Only I am not insane."

"If you're willing to kill people then you are no different."

Ark sighed. She should have assumed it would go this way.

"I mean you no harm Kal-El. I followed your ship to Earth and protected you, and I have done so since you started drawing attention to yourself. I knew you would not agree with my choice to end the metahuman's life. It was not my intention for you to blame yourself."

He tried to grab her but he was still not at his full strength so she was easily able to hold his arms at bay.

"I see now that you no longer need me."

"You have been spying on me!"

She frowned and used her superspeed to fly away. He hadn't quite mastered that yet so she lost him very quickly and returned to the ship. The computer's emotionless voice chastised her when she walked onto the bridge.

"You have failed in your mission. The seed has not been planted and you have revealed yourself to Kal-El."

"Shut up computer."

The computer went silent. Ark collapsed into the captain's chair foot dangled over one of the arms she glanced at the two countdowns running on the main screen. The top one was how long it would be before she would have the seed cleared of the genetic memories her creator had built into the base genetic structure of all the Kryptonian DNA he'd secreted aboard the ship. The second was how long before the ship launched the seed on its own. She did not have enough time and the failsafe was hard coded into the ship. The only way to remove it was to wipe the core which she could not do without killing her charges. She frowned at the numbers. Hopefully the estimate was wrong.

Kansas – Metropolis – Precious Angels Children's Hospice – November 31, 2025

Amber was sitting in her wheelchair behind a desk and was completely lost at the page of letters before her. She could ready fine with her fingers. She had never seen a letter before she woke up at the Hospice. Ark watched her progeny stare at the page before her. Unlike the staff at Precious Angels, she knew exactly who Amber was. She had already determined the cause of the explosion. Exactly what BMC had done to her. Ark had decided based on previous experiences with Clark a less hands on approach was required when dealing with children. She lacked experience in dealing with children and also was somewhat stunted emotionally. Humans were much better suited to raise children then a Kryptonian artificial intelligence. They also had to fail to grow. She feared it was her influence that had prevented Kal-El from surviving his fate. Still watching her creation suffer didn't sit well with her. She walked to a shelf and pulled a brail to English dictionary book down and put it beside Amber. Amber looked up at the source of the book and her eyes went wide when she saw it was her physiotherapist.

"Thank you, ma'am."

Ark nodded and walked out of the room before the instructors noticed her. April looked after her then back at Amber.

"What is that?"

"To help me read."

Kansas – Metropolis – Daily Planet – September 8, 1979

Ark was disguised as a human resources representative for the biggest news paper in Kansas. She was amazed the human's killed trees for this trash. Krypton had a global information network. Perhaps this is why Krypton was so barren. The humans were making the same mistakes. And how much worse would it be if Tahrao-Ju had his way and rebirthed the Kryptonian race. The same mistakes over again. The woman she had replaced was dead. Not by her hand. This cesspool of a world was filled with primitive murderers. Kal-El would have his work cut out for him. And the metahuman crisis they were experiencing wasn't helping it. The power just seemed to enhance the human need to crush their fellows underfoot and not better their world. She plastered a smile on her simulated lips when Kal-El walked into her office. If she hadn't stepped in he wouldn't have even been considered for this position. No employment records for five years. She stood up and offered her hand.

"Thank you for coming in again."

"I appreciate your considering me for the position ma'am."

Ark sat down. At this point Kal-El could have a temper tantrum and smash the office up and he would still get the job. Ark had talked him up to the Luthors.

"Mr. Kent, Clark. The Daily Planet appreciates your interest in a position here. You have impeccable references. However, we are concerned about this five-year blank spot in your work history. I was wondering if you could enlighten us to what you did during it?"

Clark adjusted his glasses.

"Well, ma'am. I was adopted and I wanted to find out about my birth parents. It took a while to track down and assimilate the information, come to terms with my origins, so to speak."

"I take it you were successful?"

"Yes, Ma'am I was."

"Should have mentioned that. That is what investigative journalism is all about. Well with that out of the way, Clark. Welcome to the Daily Planet. You'll start Monday. When you arrive sign in and report to Perry White for your press credentials and assignments."

She stood as Clark did and offered her hand. He shook her hand firmly.

"Good luck, Clark."

She watched him leave and once he was out of sight she stood up and walked out of the office, it was time to check on her other charge.

Kansas – Metropolis – Precious Angels Children's Hospice – November 31, 2025

Amber was sore from her physical therapy. Her legs ached. It was a new sensation. Pain she was used to. Pain from her legs and feet was new. She never had feeling in them before. Kat and another nurse helped her into the bath. Kat pulled the curtain closed and sat down on the toilet and pulled out her book.

"Amber, you just let me know when you're ready to get out. I will be right here."

Amber looked at the various bathing implements and realized she had no idea who to do this. She knew there was shampoo, conditioner and soap. Usually there was some for of cloth involved but all that was in here was a strange looking ball of fabric that felt strange. She quickly checked for brail on the bottles arrayed before her, but they had none. She bit her lower lip. She was so embarrassed assuming most thirteen-year-olds were fully capable of this. She fought hard to not cry in frustration. She closed her eyes tightly and then spoke very softly.

"Excuse me, ma'am. Could you, help?"

Kat called back.

"What do you need, Amber?"

"I don't know what to do."

Kat closed her book and stood up, placing it on the back of the sink and pushed the curtain aside. Revealing a frustrated Amber with tears dripping from her eyes. She smiled.

"I'm sorry Amber. Most kids your age don't want an adult in the way."

"I don't know what to do first."

Kat nodded and sat on the edge of the tub. Her scrubs were going to get drenched but she could just change. She picked up the shampoo bottle. She showed it to Amber and ran her finger along the word shampoo.

"Shampoo. Hold out your hand."

Amber held out her hand and Kat squirted a dollop of clear goo in it from the bottle.

"Now rub your hands together and lather it into your hair. Make you get all of it. You have beautiful hair, I'm sure you want to keep it that way."

Amber followed Kat's instructions then did the same with the conditioner after Kat helped her rinse. She went for the spray hose to rinse again and Kat shook her head.

"Nope. That has to stay in for a minute."

Kat picked up the shower puff.

"I never use these. Some people say they're bad for you. But it's up to you."

Amber nodded and shook her head. Kat tossed it over her shoulder. Kat picked up the bodywash. She offered it to Amber.

"Body wash. Squirt in your hand and get it all over then rinse it, and your conditioner. I'll go back to my book let me know when you're ready to get out and we'll get you dried off and dressed. Going to give you some privacy now. Make sure you get behind the ears and clean your piercings those can get infected really easily."

She pulled the curtain closed and went back to her book shaking her head. She felt so bad for Amber having to relearn all these. She would have been mortified at that age having an adult in the bathroom. Or anyone for that matter, she would have to have two to even get out of the tub. There was a knock on the bathroom door and Kat opened it peeking out. She was surprised to see Dr. Ivanov smiling at her. Kat hadn't been able to put her finger on why the woman set her ill at ease. For all intents and purposes, the children liked her. There was just something. The special interest she had in Amber might be it.

"Is something the matter doctor?"

"I was just checking on my patient. She was very sore after her session today."

"She's just in the bath. I'll have them page you."

Amber called out.

"I'm actually done, ma'am."

Kat looked at the doctor.

"I'll get a nurse and let you know when she's out."

Ark smiled that fake plastered smile she'd been using for decades.

"No need, I can assist you with that."

Kat couldn't think of an excuse to avoid it, so she nodded and the pair helped Amber out of the tub. Kat dried Amber while Ark assisted the girl in standing. Kat was padding the back of her hair while Ark held Amber's arms.

"We should probably get your hair cut at some point Amber."

"Her hair fine as it is if that is how she likes it."

Ark was trying to deflect Kat's interest. She knew how well cutting Kryptonian hair went on earth. They had to do it themselves with their heat vision.

"I'm not used to long hair… I don't think. It feels strange. Maybe we should go long enough for a ponytail but not much else?"

Ark spoke a bit too quickly.

"Perhaps I can take care of it for her? I dabbled in hair dressing school before choosing medicine."

Kat blinked at her and Amber nodded furiously. Not wanting to deal with even more new people. She was already overwhelmed.

"Maybe we should get our hospital hairdresser to do it, hon."

Amber shook her head. Kat looked at her in the mirror and saw the discomfort in Ambers eyes. She dropped it after a glance at Ark. She couldn't figure out what the Physiotherapist's deal was and it vexed her.

Kansas – Metropolis – Lois and Clarks Apartment – January 3, 1983

"I saw you with her Clark! Don't you dare deny it."

Clark fixed his glasses.

"It is not what you think, Lois."

"Oh, isn't it? Vanishing at all hours. Not being there when I need you. Then when you're supposed to be working, I see you talking to that… hussy?"

Clark opened and closed his fists. He knew his relationship wasn't going to last with Lois so long as he kept his secret… secret. But he wasn't ready for his hand to be forced. Lois's father was a General in the US army, he had made his feelings on Superman quite clear. He was an alien menace. He and Lex Luthor were as thick as thieves. He trusted Lois but it was just to close to his nemesis to feel safe telling her. Lois crossed her arms.

"Its because you think I had a fling with Superman, isn't it?"

Clark blinked at her and adjusted his glasses again.

"No. No. I know you aren't. I just can't tell you about her."

"Then I don't think we have a future Clark Kent."

"Diana is just a friend Lois, just be rational, please."

"Oh, because I'm being an irrational woman? Is that it?"

"No. I just…"

"Unless you tell me the whole truth about yourself right this second you can walk out that door and never come back."

Clark reached out his hands towards her and she stepped back shaking her head.

"Truth or door."

Clark sighed started picking up his things that Lois had helpfully already packed. She pulled the diamond ring of her finger and threw it at him. Clark caught it and tried to offer it back. She shoved him.

"I want nothing to do with you! Go!"

Lois pointed at the door Clark looked back at her and sighed then left. Maybe she was onto something he thought. Diana did know the truth about him. They had a lot in common. Maybe…