#37: Kon-El, Part 1 (of 4)

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Issue #37: "Kon-El" Pt. 1
Written by: Roy Flinchum
Cover by: Roy Flinchum
Edited by: Brian Burchette[/center]

Earth: Now

"He's been gone for days. No one has seen him." Lois tapped her pencil absent-mindedly on the edge of Perry's desk. "I've even contacted the Justice League; they haven't had any contact from him. No one has since that fight with that guy over Metropolis"

"Is your concern as a reporter or something else, Lane?" Perry tried another headline on the paper mock up he was looking at.

"Both."

"Then your editor says, there's obviously a story here, Superman just doesn't disappear for days unless something’s up. Try his last known contact, go from there. Your friend says, he’s been gone before Lois, he's Superman, he deals with things that, lets face it is often beyond our scope. Don't worry, he'll be fine, he is Superman after all."

Lois went back to her desk picked up her phone and began to dial the number for Captain Maggie Sawyer, she stopped, hung up the phone and started for the elevator. This would be better in person.

Krypton: sixteen months before its inevitable destruction

Lara rubbed her swollen belly as she padded softly into the lab where her husband worked over meticulous calculations.

Jor-El looked up from his work. "How's my own little birthing matrix"?

"Stop it", Lara chided. "I can't believe that I let you talk me into this. You know the council will be furious if they find out."

"They won't find out Lara, not until I'm ready for them to know. This is the only way to show them that to ensure the future of the Kryptonian race we must abandon the birthing matrix technology. It's stripping Kryptonians of their genetic stability."

"I know your research husband. Kryptonian's genetic viability is slowly declining, in generations you predict that Kryptonians will revert back to stone carrying magthors."

Jor-El laughed and patted his wife's stomach. "Well, that's an oversimplification, but basically yes."
Jor-El turned back to his work.

Lara laid a hand on his shoulder. "Is there something wrong?"

"If these calculations are correct, Krypton's bio-diversity is the least of our problems. Please sit down Lara, these readings are from Krypton's core."

The Fortress of Solitude: Antarctic

He could barely move. The kryptonian drugs that Dr. Xadu pumped into him were keeping him sedated. The red radiation had stopped giving his body time to heal before the next round of [bold]test[/bold]. His head lolled to the side. He could see Kara on the table a few feet away. The drugs muddled his mind. He had to do something. He mustered enough concentration to send a blast of heat vision at the thin line of tubing that ran down into her arm.

Why do they have to always hide out in the creepy old abandoned buildings, Bradley thought. There was a time when the criminal element had some class. Not like it is nowadays, when any street thug with a gun and low morals can peddle enough crack to make himself the self proclaimed king of the street corner. They'd buy a big car and, what was it they called it, "Pump" it out and still live in some ramshackle apartment. Been in this game too long when the criminals have changed and you haven't Slam. That's what his partner told him. The next week he was caught in hail of gun-fire from one of those "pumped' out cars and died in the street. Slam decided then he would get out of the business. That was three years ago.

The front door hadn't been used in years, Slam gave it a shove with his shoulder, the door creaked in protest and gave way. Inside was dark; the air was fetid like meat that had been left sitting out for days.
Slam fished around in his pocket for his pen light and twisted the head on the barrel. The little beam of light bored through the darkness. He was in the lobby. On the walls hung pictures of what the facility had looked like in it's prime, still a dump, thought Bradley. Guess when the surrounding area started to go downhill people cared less and less what kinds of pests they had to put up with.

"Hey! Dobson! You in here!" Slam called out, and rubbed his thumb along the handle of his gun. A little snub nose .38. The guys gave him a hard time over it, when they all had their "glock and speils" as Slam called them. But he would tell them, doesn't matter what you use boys, if you're good enough whoever you're shooting at is still dead.

Slam opened another door; it led out onto a platform with a ladder that led down onto a large warehouse floor. He slashed the beam around the darkness. Several large barrels and what looked like truck parts lay around the floor. He thought he heard something skitter in the corner above him. He swung the light around; there was nothing there but cobwebs.

Then he heard it, it started slowly like air leaking from a tire. A voice raspy, like talking through gravel.

"Why are you here?"

Slam drew his gun and pointed it with the beam of light as he swept it around the room.

"I'm looking for Robert Dobson."

"Why?"

Slam continued to sweep the room with the light as he slowly descended the stairs, taking care to not make any sound on the rough metal grating.

"I was told he would have some information I need."

"What kind of information?"

Slam continued swinging the light looking for the source of the voice.

"I'm not playing twenty questions with you. I want to talk to Dobson."

Something wet and slimy dropped on Slam's hand, he instinctively shined the light up to the ceiling where the drop had come from. The more insect than human being known as the Hellgramitte dropped from the ceiling. One of the six insect arms that wiggled at his side knocked the gun and the light from Slam's hand. Hellgramitte's human arms grabbed Slam by the shoulders and pulled him toward his face with the large bulbous insect eyes and the pincer like mandibles that sprang from his jaws working in and out like a hungry man licking his lips.
"You are talking to Dobson", he hissed.

"Put me down insect."

"Why should I?"

"So you can stop the bleeding."

"What bleeding?"

Slam Bradley cocked his head back and with all the force he could muster smacked his forehead into Hellgrammites all too human nose. There was a thick wet crunching sound. Hellgramitte dropped Slam and staggered backwards. His human hands covering his nose that was gushing blood while his insect ones waved about at his side.

"You stunobabid, you brode my node!"

Slam picked up his gun and flashlight. "So grow a new one."

"Dats damfibians you bidiot."

Slam grabbed one of Dobsons insect arms and placed the barrel of his gun up against his side where it joined his body. "Bet you could stand to lose a few of these too."

"Whad the hell are youb crady!"

"Police shrink thinks so. Tell me about the buzz on the computer, something big is going down with this Xadu character. What is it?"

"Pidd off I'm not telling you nubbin."

The sound from the little sub nose .38 filled the warehouse and proved to be just as effective as any glock and spiel.

Dr. Xadu heard the commotion, and cursed in Kryptonian. He had what he needed – a success. But if he couldn’t get out of the Fortress with it; everything he had worked for would be for naught. He should have known better; the house of El had always been a stumbling block.

No matter, he thought to himself, he had other tricks up his sleeve. He went to the crystal counsel and began to rearrange several of them rather hurriedly. He just needed enough time to get his project or weapon, depending on who the highest bidder would be, out of harms way.

He could feel the vibration of the complex shift as he finished replacing the last crystal. Now he was in charge of the entire place. He wondered if Kal-El really understood everything that had been given to him. Xadu couldn’t imagine that he did, or that he would even know what to do with the power at his fingertips.

“You’re both too late,” His voice echoed throughout the fortress as he watched them defeat the robots. “You have both given me the tools I need to create the ultimate weapon. How ironic that the House of El will cause the downfall of the planet that its remaining survivors have sworn to protect.

“You’re not getting away with this,” the voice of Superman shouted as he hovered above his home away from home.

Xadu laughed, the sound bouncing everywhere. “I already have, Kal-El. And now, I’m going to show you a function of this Fortress that your pathetic father was too afraid to show you. A Kryptonian weapon that will send a seismic pulse directly into the heartland of the country that you call home; devastating towns and crops for years to come.”

He saw the look of surprise on their faces; watched as they halted in midair, uncertain of what to do next. “You didn’t know, did you? You thought Jor-El trusted the last son of Krypton, but you were wrong. Say goodbye to Kansas... Superman.”

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