Superman noticed he was still hovering above the ocean. There was no land beneath him. 'Luthor and Kitty drowned!' he wondered.

He didn't really believe it. But the green crystal doesn't lie. So the crystals must be beneath him even if Luthor wasn't.

Superman dived to the ocean. Faster than any submarine or sea animal could, he reached the ocean bottom in under a minute, traveling so fast, the water he passed through got heated to almost boiling temperature. He hovered just about one hundred meters off the ocean bottom. Green crystal still held out in front of him. In a few seconds the green crystal's glow blinked on and off slowly. Suddenly all around him, he noticed 6 small points of white light also began to blink on and off, in tune with the green crystal.

Using his super vision, he zoomed in on the sources of the lights and saw that they were indeed the crystals that Luthor stole. But there was no sign of Luthor or Kitty. He assumed they must have accidentally dropped it while fleeing the kryptonite island.

Superman was happy to have found his stolen crystals, but was disappointed that Luthor was still missing. If he's missing, he's probably up to something. And that something was probably dangerous to millions of innocent people, and himself.

Superman quickly gathered the crystals into a small bag which he had brought with him, and flew back to the surface. He landed on the top deck of the lead navy ship helping with the search.

"Superman!", yelled one surprised sailor who was nearby him.

"I'd like to speak to the admiral please," Superman requested.

"Yes sir Superman, I'll let him know you're here!" quipped the sailor, glad to be of service to his favorite hero.

A few minutes later, the man in charge of the search fleet, Admiral Caesar Croneaus, stepped into the deck. "Superman! You wanted to speak to me?" he asked.

"Yes sir, Admiral Croneaus. I've found the crystals..." Superman started to say.

"That's great news!" exclaimed the admiral.

"Unfortunately Luthor is still missing."

"Leave that to us...we're coordinating our efforts with the NSA. They are analyzing sattelite images of this area taken the day the island appeared. Due to some radiation inteferrence from the island, they have to wade through a lot of useless images, but eventually they should be able to figure out where Luthor's chopper went."

"That's good to hear admiral. I'm going to secure these crystals, then come back here to continue the search. Thanks for all your help!"

"No Superman, thank you! For coming back to Earth. The world needs you now more than you know. You know, many people thought you'ld never be back, but not me, I knew you'ld be back, and I'm glad you're here now."

"I..." Superman started to say, but was quickly interrupted by the admiral.

"The difference between us Superman is that I do my job because it's my duty, its my responsibility to my country, to my superiors giving the orders, it's also the way I earn a living. But you...you just do it because you care about us. You don't expect anything in return. It's not your duty to help us...a man like you can literally do anything he wants, but you spend your time helping people. I really appreciate that."

Superman was glad to be appreciated. He didn't know what to say except "Thanks Admiral" and smile. He was about to fly off, when the Admiral called out again and said "Ignore that pulitzer winning article Ms. Lane wrote. Thats a load of bullshit. If you ask me, she was just acting like any female who was trying to get over a man she loved, but couldn't, and just wrote that crap to distract herself from her feelings."

Superman nodded. "Thanks for the insight Admiral, I really appreciate it," and with that he flew off into the sky.

Superman wanted to hide his crystals where he believed Luthor can never get his hands at them. He didn't want to return them to the Fortress of Solitude until he finished dealing with Luthor. He needed something secure. A place he believed Luthor would never be able to get to. So, he flew to Moon.

Superman landed in the Sea of Tranquility. The stars and stripes stood there, next to the original Lunar Lander. He gazed with respect at the flag, planted there during a more idealistic era, when the nation was under the helm of an idealistic and capable leader. He found it sad that Earth has lost the capability to put human beings on the moon, and that it will take many years, perhaps a decade or more for them to be able to do so again. He admired the courage of the men who first flew up here, on nothing more than a high tech tin can, guided by vaccum tube electronics and computers whose power cannot even compare to that of today's bargain priced laptops. He wondered if he would have had the courage to do as they did, if he did not have his powers. The courage to essentially strap yourself on a giant missile filled with highly explosive fuel, and hope that everything goes right, hope that all the vehicles' millions of parts do what they are supposed to do. 'This is the reason my father sent me here,' he thought. 'Father said humans have the capacity for greatness, even with all their faults. . .all they need is guidance,' Superman paused, then continued 'and I Kal-El, am to be that guide...'

He believed that once humans overcame their flaws, that they had the potential to surpass all that Krypton had achieved. His father gave him the sum total knowledge of Krypton, and all it had gathered from the other alien civilizations they made contact with...all that information, contained in one small green crystal, which he carried with him right now. Someday...when Earth is ready, I will give them this information. It was after all his father's intent. It seems his father hoped that someday. . .Earth will become a second Krypton, or will continue Krypton's civilization, continue its hopes and dreams, and achieve all that Krypton had yet to achieve, with the guidance of his only son. Superman looked up at the Earthrise, the crescent of Earth gleaming blue and white, and shook his head, remembered all the stuff he saw in the news and thought "It's gonna take a while..."

He looked eastward. He knew that a few hundred meters away were the marks on the moondust left by his own Kryptonian spacecraft. He had completed the final assembly--if you can even call growing something "assembly"--of his Kryptonian spacecraft on the moon, before he left for the ruins of Krypton. He remembered he was so hopeful then. That me might find something. He wasn't sure what he was looking for actually. Maybe survivors of Krypton, living in a space station, or something. Perhaps he just wanted to find out for himself, whether he was or wasn't the last Kryptonian left alive. But he found nothing but the ruins of his planet--now nothing more than an asteroid belt orbiting a decaying star. He still held out hope that there were some lost colonies or survivors of Krypton out there. That he wasn't the only one left, that he wasn't alone. Someday when Earth needs him less, when he'd finally figured out what to do with Lois Lane, maybe he'll grow another Kryptonian spacecraft and find out. Maybe they could all explore space as a family...him, Lois, and their son. Superman smiled at that thought. The spacecraft he grew was a highly experimental design by his father--essentially a "beta version" in today's terminology. It's several orders of magnitude faster than the spacecraft that brought him to Earth. His father could have put him in such a spacecraft, but since he was just a baby and not yet fully developed, for safety's sake, his father put him in a slower but more technologically stable spacecraft. With the experimental spacecraft, he can cover vast distances in the blink of an eye, and maybe if he searched hard enough he will find what he's looking for.

Superman snapped himself out of his wishful thinking. There were more urgent matters to attend to. He headed to the Lunar Lander.

Superman was careful not disturb Niel Armstrong's historic footprints. Floating himself instead of walking the final few meters. Superman then stashed his crystals inside a compartment in the Lunar Lander. That's as secure as it could possibly get. Since Earth currently has no spacecraft capable of putting humans on the moon, it'll be years before any human will set foot here again. But he kept the green crystal with him.

Back in the Atlantic Ocean...

A sailor controlling a UAV to search for any signs of a helicopter wreckage saw something funny, it was a coconut, that seemed to have been split in half, and tied back together, floating near his ship. He brought his UAV around, and used its camera to zoom in on the curious coconut...

There was something inside...he froze the feed from the UAV, and magnified the view. Through the split in the coconut shells, he could see something inside...

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hi All! I won't be able to upload the next update till next week. Work has been really busy, way too much overtime, and I really need a break. So I won't be doing any writing this weekend. Please read and review!

-assunta