-- Chapter 9 -- Ghosts --
The Kent barn loft, a hay filled sanctuary, scented by the sweet ripe smells of autumn, still held the humidity and heat from the afternoon sun. Clark crouched by his telescope unphased by the stuffy heat and adjusted the device so that instead of Lana Lang's front porch, it pointed to the stars. Scanning the heavens absently, Clark tried to detach himself from the insanity of the last few hours. Not surprisingly, he failed utterly. Clark picked one of the stars, a random one. He didn't know its name. He didn't want to know it. Two strangers from the heavens... Clark addressed the celestial body. "I'm an alien, and I'm scared. I would imagine that giant balls of gas like yourself rarely get frightened, but I do." Clark shifted his lens slightly focusing more directly on the star. "I really need someone to talk to. Mom and Dad mean well. I just can't seem to say what I'm thinking around them all of a sudden."
Clark leaned back into the fresh hay and let his eyes drift shut. He could still see the star in his mind and the one-sided conversation continued. "This is a little hard to admit, and I'd never tell Mom or Dad this, but I think maybe I want that woman to be what she says she is. I don't want to leave my home, and I'm not going to, but there are a lot of questions I'd like to ask. I want to know who my parents are, why they deserted me. I want to know what I am, and what I'm becoming." Clark tried to imagine the Earth filled with people just like him, a world where everyone was fast and strong and could see through things. Clark grinned. "I bet they used a lot of lead up there."
Almost like an answer from the nameless star, a voice rang out. "Lead was not necessary in a polite society. I can answer your other questions as well. You're a Kryptonian, the last son of a great and powerful race."
Clark almost knocked his telescope out of the loft when he sat up. She was back. The Eradicator was in his loft. "I'm a what?"
"You're a Kryptonian, only son to Jorel and Lara. Your mother was an artist. She sculpted with light and sound. Your father was a scientist, well respected and brilliant." She didn't pause. "Your parents cared for you a great deal and saved your life despite a contradictory decree from the Kryptonian ruling Council." Like a carnival barker trying to entice a fairgoer into her attraction with just enough information, the Eradicator stopped speaking. "If you'd like to see them, your parents, you should try to use the piece of Kryptonium I left behind. You remember the little blue crystal. Be mentally firm with it, don't let it drain you or distract you. Those little crystals have a tendency to want to sing nonsense all day." She headed for the exit past his telescope. "I will be close. If you need me, call."
How the heck had she gotten into his loft without him noticing her? Clark stared open-mouthed as the Eradicator disappeared into the night sky. You're a Kryptonian. Clark shook his head. He was Clark Kent, son to Jonathan and Martha. Biology didn't matter. His parents were the people who raised him, not the ones who abandoned him. Your parents cared for you a great deal and saved your life…Clark felt a guilty shiver run down his back. He wanted to see them, this artist and scientist that supposedly gave birth to him.
Clark was sitting at the kitchen table with the lead Pandora's box in front of him, before he stopped to reconsider the impulse that had driven him from his loft to the kitchen in two seconds flat. This could be dangerous. He needed to be clearheaded to keep everyone safe from his "new friend" the Eradicator. He didn't even know what these crystals were or how they worked. Like a child contemplating the forbidden cookie jar, Clark tried not to focus on the negative possibilities. The first stone hadn't actually hurt him. It made him feel safe even.
Clark flipped open the little box a tiny crack. The blue glow spilled across his face and he almost snatched one of the stones up before he caught himself. The Eradicator had said to be firm. Well if they could sing into his mind, maybe they could hear his. Stop playing games! The mental shout seemed to work, and the unnatural compulsion to hold the stones faded. Clark smiled a little and pushed the box all the way open. The Eradicator hadn't lied about being able to stand up to the "Kryptonium."
They looked identical glowing there, side by side. Which one of you knows who my biological parents are? Clark hadn't honestly expected an answer. The question was an idle one. One of the stones flared brighter though. Clark stared at the rock. This was foolish and dangerous... and he was going to do it.
Unlike the last time, when he grabbed one of these rocks on compulsion, Clark wasn't swept away or lost. The tiny crystal felt warm under his fingers and it glowed furiously. Clark started to speak aloud, but he looked up the stairs warily. His parents wouldn't understand this. Instead, Clark stepped out into the yard, and headed into the corn.
Now a safe distance from anyone who might question him, Clark stared hard at the stone. "Can you show me my biological parents?"
The crystal made its reply in a strange melodic language. Then it repeated in English. "Would you like to switch language preferences?"
"You know English?" Clark frowned down at the strange thing. It couldn't be alien then.
"Language preference switched to English. Language-English acquired and downloaded by the Eradicator, do you wish to verify the accuracy of the lingual conversion?"
"No," Clark whispered. The Eradicator seemed to be quite proficient at English, however she had learned it. "My biological parents, I asked you to tell me about them, show them to me."
"Mode switched to modern Kryptonian genealogy. Identify yourself," the crystal commanded.
"I'm Clark Kent?"
"Identification invalid." The crystal flashed once. "Mind-scan conclusive. Welcome Kalel." The little rock rose above his palm twirling and radiating light. The light seemed to become more focused and shot out in regular rapid patterns, eventually coming together into a hazy pair of life-size images, holograms.
"That's them?" Clark didn't respond to the clipped affirmative the little crystal offered. If this was real, if these were his parents...my dad was taller than me. Maybe I'm not through growing. My mom had curly short hair. Clark felt as if his throat were closing up. Little details about people he didn't even know, but he scanned their faces again and again, trying to see himself, to see a connection. "They aren't alive are they? The Eradicator said I was the last of my kind. What happened to the Kryptonians? Why did they die?"
"Data not available. Kryptonian civilization still shines according to last updates," the device said.
Clark nodded, no Kryptonians to update. "Can you tell me about them, Jorel and Lara?"
"Superficial biography available. Detailed accounts can be found in less general reference libraries.
"Jorel: fellow of cosmology, mineralogy, and biochemistry; current research – solar fluctuations and their effects on Kryptonium; life-mate Lara, son Kalel.
"Lara: artist guild member; master sculptor; life-mate Jorel, son Kalel.
Clark reached out a hand and passed it through his biological father's face. He sounded important, brilliant, like the Eradicator had said, but he was smiling. It made him seem almost approachable. Clark turned toward Lara, his biological mother. She looked joyful, mischievous, childlike even. She was so much smaller that Jorel, petite and perfect, like a porcelain doll. "I bet you were happy. Why did you send me here though? If something bad was going to happen and you knew, why didn't you come too? It's not fair for you and your Eradicator to waltz in here after I have a life and try to take that away. I won't leave my life for a couple of ghosts. They need me here. The dead don't need anyone, and I don't need you."
"Power saver mode initiated." The holograms vanished and the Kryptonium crystal blinked much dimmer. "Would you like to inquire along other lines, Kalel."
Kalel, Clark had missed the little thing calling him that the first time. Kalel? "No...wait, can you tell me about the Eradicator?"
"Mode switched, Historical records." A new hologram appeared, instead of two people, a group of five stood there. Four of them were obviously aliens. Each was bizarre in a different way from a lizard-like humanoid to a monolithic gray slug-like creature. Clark hardly gawked at the bizarre projections. The central Eradicator captured his attention. From her long black hair to her perfectly shaped body, it was his Eradicator. "The Eradicator, a weapon designed to be the ultimate in destructive capability, while retaining finesse and small size. Only five Eradicators were produced and used in the third Galactic conflict. Of the five, four were dismantled, due to flawed logic circuits and deteriorating stability. The fifth was placed into indefinite storage."
Flawed logic? That did not sound good. How strong was she? Would he be able to handle her. "Does it have a weakness? What are its abilities?" Clark asked.
"The only true documented flaw in the design is in the logic circuit. An Eradicator should be unable to act without direction from a Kryptonian. In actuality, the system loses stability over time and the machine begins to take independent action. Critics concluded that the AI was too complex to function smoothly." The hologram began to fade as the crystal slowed and dimmed.
"And it's abilities?" Clark asked. His little blue piece of Kryptonium was acting like it needed batteries. Maybe it took double A's?
"To continue functioning, an infusion of energy is required."
The crystal was dropping so Clark held out his hand to catch it. "What do I do?"
"May I recharge fully?" the crystal asked.
Clark frowned down at it and shrugged. "Recharge yourself."
A dizzying weakness washed through Clark and he dropped to his knees. It was almost like the feeling meteor rocks left him with. God he was cold. Clark didn't even get the chance to put two and two together so he could drop the Kryptonium, before he was unconscious on the ground.
From several hundred yards away, the Eradicator might have laughed if she'd been programmed with a sense of humor. Clark, no, Kalel wasn't in any real danger from the Kryptonium crystal. The device was sentient and it knew better than to harm her master. It would drain him but not unto death. She had warned him not to allow the little beast free reign over him.
The Eradicator had learned much already from her observations, both of her Kryptonian and of the environment and society which had shaped him. He had developed quite well, all things considered. The surrogate parents, while not Kryptonian, had a reasonable sense of justice and logic about them. They were a bit too timid and apt to hide, but that could be trained out of their son.
The Eradicator pulled all but a small amount of her AI away from observing her unconscious master. She reached into her small pouch and removed a green glowing piece of meteor rock, Kryptonite. She had been somewhat disappointed to find this bit of evil present on the planet. This rock was an enemy she had never been given a chance to fight. Her creators had been working to tame Kryptonite for as long as their society had survived. "Your kind destroyed Krypton," she whispered to the stone. A new emotion, rage, filled the Eradicator. She didn't even recognize the new corruption in her logic system. She squeezed the rock in her hand, grinding it into a fine powder. "Still you live," she whispered to the tiny granules flecked across her palm. Each granule would grow into a new distinct organism, just as insane as the original had been. "I will beat you though. You didn't kill all of them. A Kryptonian remains to put you back to rights." The Eradicator blew at the bits of Kryptonite and they flew away into the night's breeze, like a glowing cloud of gangrenous pixie dust.
