Lara sensed her niece got extremely confused and she would be lying if she said that she blamed the girl. It was really hard not to be confused in the state that she was in. She had been in stasis for an extremely long time. She made her presence felt.
"Wait, Lara, you're an AI?" Kara asked her and Lara nodded. Her eyes went over to the girl that resembled Lara, only with darker hair. Then she looked back to the Lara that shimmered in the light. Her eyes fixated on the crystals.
Certainly a holographic projection and judging by the way that she could reach out and touch the person, very real.
"Yes, Kara, I am," she told the girl. She hoped that her niece wouldn't be too shell shocked regarding what happened. "Are you okay? What do you remember?"
Kara frowned, that was actually a pretty good question and one she wished that she had something resembling an answer to. The blonde furiously racked her brain in an attempt to get some answers. What did she remember?
Some faint recollections returned to her mind and she shook her head. It was horrifying to remember this. She had to do it otherwise she wouldn't have any peace of mind.
"I…..I remember bits and pieces of what happened," Kara admitted nervously. "The war with him was over, and he was banished, along with his followers. The Counsel seized the Phantom Zone construct for their own purposes, and Jor-El was taken in for questioning about what happened…..she was born…..where is she?"
Kara's body became extremely rigid when it all hit her. The girl was in a state of shock. Everything hit her completely at once. All of the stress, all of the tragedy, all of the turmoil, just everything washed over her quickly.
Harry sensed how nervous she was getting and he reached forward. His strong hand clenched hers.
"Where is she?" Kara asked, a bit gentle tone. She looked towards this young man. The blonde focused on him for the first time. Although she didn't know why she didn't notice him. Must have been really frazzled. "Who are…"
"Harry, Harry Evans," Harry whispered to her, allowing her to grab his hand. "I was the one that found you in your ship, at the bottom of the down, well I had some help, Jean and Claire helped me as well."
Claire knew that they would have to tell her pretty soon, especially now that Kara slowly began to freak out.
"I followed her to Earth, I was going to make sure she got where she needed to be okay, and to look over her," Kara said in exasperation, squeezing his hand tightly. "Your daughter, Clara…"
"I think she turned out alright," Claire said and Kara's eyes snapped over towards the dark haired female that spoke. The one that she originally thought was Lara.
She was about to ask how Claire could have known. Suddenly it hit her. She couldn't have been so dense. That was a true blonde moment, as the humans might have said.
The blonde's mouth curled into a knowing smile. She weakly picked herself up. Kara's hand still intertwined with Harry's.
Harry held onto her hand to make sure she didn't fall over. She didn't and she staggered over. Her arms fell around Claire in a tight embrace.
"Clara, I'm glad to see that you're okay," Kara said, and she shook her head.
"Well, we need to make sure that you're okay, okay?" Claire asked her.
Kara nodded, she needed that as well. She had been down there in the ship. More bits and pieces came back to her in a flash in her mind. Her head nearly throbbed at the thought of what she remembered. The radiation poured into the ship and if she had been down there for too much longer, she wouldn't make it.
She shivered and this young man held her hand tighter.
"They're gone, Jor-El and my mother, they were both right," Kara said, and it came back to her what happened to her mother as well.
She was in the city when it disappeared. Kara sighed long and hard, when she recalled that. Countless lives perished. Planets don't normally blow up.
This one did, oh this one did.
"Be strong," Harry whispered in her ear and Kara nodded.
"Thank you," Kara said, feeling the warmth course through her body when he squeezed her hand.
She was a survivor. She was one of the few children to be born through a natural birth on Krypton. That was considered a sin by the scientifically minded council. Children were supposed to be grown in tubes, to be engineered through perfect matches. They were born to serve a purpose and fulfill a role in society. It was mapped out what they would do from cradle to the grave.
Alura challenged that thinking. Kryptonians on their home planet didn't have that long of a life span. Between fifty or sixty years tended to be a high lifespan amount the fittest of them all. The so called perfect matches caused them to perform a certain task and once they outlived their usefulness, their life span could be measured in days.
Her mother challenged that thinking and Kara was the result of it. Alura was matched with Zor-El. The process was set up where both of their DNA would be extracted. They would be combined and incubated through the entire cycle of pregnancy. Alura double crossed Zor-El and used her family's connections to erase the process.
Kara wasn't sure how she managed the natural pregnancy. She couldn't image Zor-El consenting to sleep with her, because sex was a taboo on Krypton. Lesser races used sexual intercourse to conceive, so says the council.
The scientific process may have led to their destruction.
All Kara knew was Alura had to go off planet to have her to the colony of Argo which allowed for more enlightened thinking. They were Kryptonians that had broken away centuries ago because of a falling out with the Council. It was more peaceful than the falling out that other splinter groups had.
That being said, how healthy and strong Kara was showed that the natural way would have been better for a long term. Her mother and Lara made a pact to change the old ways of thinking before Krypton met its demise. There was only one problem. It was too late.
"They're gone, all of them are gone," Kara said, shivering.
"But, we're still here," Claire said, giving Harry a significant look.
Kara took a look into Harry's eyes for a brief second. There was something about them that seemed familiar. She couldn't really place exactly what in her state of mind.
"Will it really be okay?" Kara asked, and she nervously chewed down on her lip. She almost drew blood when she did so.
She didn't quite have the invulnerability from the yellow sun yet.
"We'll check you up," Lara said and she motioned for Claire, Harry, and Jean to leave
Kara almost wished that they didn't. She felt an Arctic chill when Harry retracted his hand from hers.
Harry got a text message that jarred him out of his thoughts.
Fury wants to speak with you. Says it's urgent.
Harry gave a long sigh, of course it was. He better go and see what Fury had to say.
"I'll be back, something has come up," Harry told the group.
Kara felt a chilling disappointment go through her body at the fact that Harry had to go. She understood though.
Harry Potter made his way to meet with Nick Fury. That was always a meeting that proved to be extremely enlightening for both of them.
He wasn't going to insult Fury's intelligence. He was going to tell him what was what and let him stew about it.
Fury walked towards Harry. One eagle eye fixed on Harry's. The young man didn't blink. Neither did Fury. It was a battle of wills and a battle of who would speak up first.
"So?" Fury asked.
"Are you going to tell me why I'm here or are you going to make me tell you?" Harry countered.
Anyone who walked by would have felt a full shudder escape through their bodies. The stubborn battle of wills continued between these two men.
"You know why you're here, Potter," Fury said.
Harry snorted. He looked amused because he was. "Well, Fury, I might have done at least three things today that could have got your panties in a snit, so you're going to have to help me narrow it down to the most direct reason."
"It's the ship, you know it was there in Smallville, and it was gone before we even showed up," Fury said.
"The ship, isn't one of your 8-9-4s," Harry said, pinching the bridge of his nose.
"0-8-4s!" Fury corrected him.
"Well, it isn't," Harry responded to him.
Fury knew that he wasn't going win this battle.
"Smallville is….."
"I know you know that there are a lot of weird things going on in Smallville, trust me, when radioactive waste drops from the sky, you're going to get a lot of oddities," Harry said, almost as if he was discussing the birds and the bees.
"We both know that radioactive waste wasn't the only thing that dropped from the sky," Fury snapped back.
"What SHIELD knows and what they're going to find out are two entirely different things," Harry said to Fury. He almost was face to face with Fury but he pulled away. "I'm going to be honest with you, I got the ship out of there. And it was a good thing that I got the ship out of there. You know who was nosing around the area, don't you?"
There was no use in hiding that information especially when Harry.
"AIM," Fury grumbled.
Harry looked smug.
"And they arrived before you did, so if I wasn't there to act, we'd have some nutcase with a big head and his army of bee keepers with alien technology that could obliterate small villages," Harry informed Fury.
"The ship…..it's that dangerous," Fury said and then he decided to go for the throat with another word. "Or is it the person on it that's dangerous?"
Harry knew that this was going to be a long meeting even before he set out to have it. Nick Fury meant well a lot of the time. Most of the time at least, he didn't know how to leave well enough alone.
"Anyone can be dangerous if provoked by people who think that they mean well," Harry said, and he decided to go for the throat this time. "Especially by people who spend most of their time creating their own monsters."
Fury didn't blink. A lot of SHIELD's enemies had the "former SHIELD agent" check box ticked in their resume.
"How many of the meteor infected did you push into the arms of people who would use them and throw them away?" Harry asked Fury.
Fury changed the subject. "You jump down the rabbit hole into the land of Oz for almost a year, and no one knows where you are. And then you come back and not even a day later you stir up shit"
"It's what I do," Harry told him. "And trust me, I didn't completely disappear."
"SHIELD lost track of your whereabouts for that long," Fury argued with him.
"The people who I wanted to know where I was, they knew where I was," Harry said. "No offense, but I don't want all of SHIELD knowing how many times I use the restroom. So excuse me if I have my secrets."
"Someone like you could be a valuable asset, if you learn a little respect," Fury grumbled.
Harry figured that they were eventually going to come around to that conversation.
"Here's the thing, I have a real problem following authority, always have, always will," Harry said. "Especially when said authority compromises my principles, but never mind that. If you must know, the person on the ship was taken under my care. Her ship components are fried. There was nothing of value left inside other than the occupant."
"I don't like this," Fury said.
"I wasn't asking you to like it," Harry said, and there was an obvious "asshole" hanging on the tip of his tongue. He held it off though.
Harry Evans was capable of restraint, most of the time. This was one of the times where he held his back.
"I see that the Blur is back in business," Fury said to him. Harry was noncommittal in his answer. "Or is she going underneath a different name?"
"She's resting because dying took a lot out of her," Harry dead panned. Then he swiftly changed the subject. "The ship is fine, the person who is in it is currently with someone I trust. And I'd keep an eye on AIM because they're up to something."
Harry had his own problem.
"Stark wanted to ask you if you had any interest of re-joining the Avengers," Fury said.
Harry paused and looked over his shoulder.
"Stark has my number if he ever needs to contact me," Harry said. "I'm not exactly hard to find."
Fury opened his mouth to say something else, but as quickly as he arrived, Harry Potter vanished into the night.
That was one of the most annoying qualities of him. He disappeared as quickly as he arrived and left Fury hanging.
Maria Hill ducked her head behind the corner in amusement. She warned Fury that he wouldn't get very far with this line of questioning.
Some people just had to learn the hard way.
Harry Potter knew that dealing with Nick Fury always would leave him extremely agitated. He got a phone call and he knew who this was from.
"Hi, Gwen, how are you doing?" Harry asked the person over the phone.
He knew that she would be calling, he just didn't know when she would be calling.
"I'm doing fine, but…I didn't know that you got back from your training," Gwen said on the other end of the phone.
"Youngest Sorcerer Supreme in history," Harry said, trying not to sound too entirely smug about the situation.
Gwen snickered. "We're really master of the obvious today, is the next thing that you're going to tell me is that Jameson has a loud mouth?"
Harry got her point well and clear.
"You're in quite the mood today," Harry said to her. "What's up?"
"Oh, I'm enjoying the scenes over here, and I figured I'd check in with a couple of people on the other side to see what's happening," Gwen said over the phone. "It's a sad state with those people, but you already knew that."
"Could you change the subject, I don't want to talk about them," Harry said. To even think about them, even if his interactions with them were limited caused him to want to punch someone.
At least twenty five percent of the problems and fires that the Sorcerer Supreme had to put out was an indirect result of the wand wavers. Granted that might have seemed like a small number, so Harry was willing to let the live their lives. They wouldn't be around that much longer at the rate they were dying out.
"Very well," Gwen said. She understood, she really did understand how much he didn't want to talk about that.
"I really appreciate it," Harry informed her and he pinched the bridge of his nose to allow a long sigh to escape from his mouth.
"I've heard some really interesting rumors," Gwen said and she drew breath when Harry remained silent. "There have been some unsavory figures who were reported moving around the area of Smallville."
Harry paused and allowed Gwen to come back in with the really obvious statement.
"Even more so than usual," she concluded. "So what's the deal?"
"You've heard the rumors, you tell me," Harry replied.
Gwen wanted to headdesk. She held herself back from doing that. "There's another ship…but there's no signs of a meteor shower…..again. Wouldn't this be about the third or fourth time that happened if there was one?"
Harry had to be honest with her. "I don't know, I lost track."
He had so many other things on his mind that he couldn't keep track of the meteor showers that hit Smallville.
"No, there wasn't another meteor showers, thank Rao," Harry said, realizing how much of a long pause there was. "There was an alien ship there….or there was before it mysterious disappeared. Right before those unsavory figures got ahold of it."
"And I don't doubt that a full savory figures that could do unsavory things no doubt," Gwen said and she chose her words carefully. These cell phones were on a specials secure tower that only five people on Earth had the codes for and two of them were talking to each other. It could never hurt to be careful despite the security. "So, the ship has been moved?"
"A trustworthy person has the ship, along with the cargo inside," Harry said. "As it turns out, the cargo that was on the ship is far more valuable than the actual ship itself."
"Hmm," Gwen muttered underneath her breath.
Harry jumped on that one really quickly. "Hmm….is that what you said….hmmm?"
"Yes, that's what I said, hmm?" Gwen asked her, she got a bit of a perverse amount of enjoyment of riling up Harry. Not too much mind you, just a little bit. "If I know you, I know what the cargo is and I know why you've taken an interest of it."
Harry smiled, there were sometimes where he could be a bit predictable. Not that he minded because predictable could be a good thing. People might overlook the very obvious if they thought that you were going to do something that was out of the box.
"The Blur fan blog will be really interested to hear about this, I'm sure," Gwen said. "And kind of pissed that she wasn't invited along for the extraction of said ship"
"To be honest, it was really a last moment thing," Harry admitted.
"I know," Gwen said, sighing and repeating herself and not realizing she did. "I know. Logic might get in the way of people when they get upset about the coolness factor."
"Aren't you upset that you didn't get to see the ship?" Harry asked.
"Upset that I scheduled a vacation out of the country on the one day where you're going to unearth an alien ship," Gwen said to him. "You know, that should really teach me to take vacations. You miss all kinds of cool shit. But then what am I going to do?"
Harry laughed in amusement. "Well, you take care over there for the rest of your vacation. I don't want to hear about any international incidents."
He could almost hear Gwen pouting over the phone.
"Do you honestly have so little faith in me?" Gwen asked him.
"I was being serious," Harry said, and he made his walk around the corner so he couldn't be seen. He could teleport towards the Fortress at that point. "So, when are you getting back?"
"Barring any screw ups with my flight, I should be able to get there by Friday," Gwen said. "So, what's in the news?"
"Jameson said that Spider-Girl was a threat and a menace," Harry told her.
"Really, and I suppose the next thing you're going to tell me is some politician lied somewhere in the world about something," Gwen said in mock exasperation. "Take care Harry…"
"Enjoy the rest of your vacation," Harry said.
"I will because nothing has tried to kill me," Gwen said and she knocked on the table.
"Well, keep your eyes peeled now that you said that," Harry warned her.
Gwen sighed, it was obvious that she knew that she jinxed herself. One day she would learn to keep her mouth shut.
"Love you Harry, talk to you later," Gwen said.
"Love you too, we've got a lot to catch up on when you get back," Harry responded to her.
The call went dead and Harry took that as his cue to make his way back to the Fortress.
Kara sat perfectly still and calm. She normally didn't like to get checked out by anyone. Lara was someone that she trusted.
She missed Harry, but she understood why he left. She decided to focus her attention on her cousin, who she missed all that time growing up. Kara's heart ached with the thought of all that she missed.
The only thing that strengthened her and gave her clarity of thought was the fact that Lara was here for Claire. Her aunt would have not let her daughter be anything less than completely okay. And she was sure that the adopted parents Clara had would have been fine. Lara picked them out, although there was so much that could go wrong.
None of them were thinking rationally in those final days of Krypton. The civil war ravished the country and their traditional means of escape, the exit portals, had been destroyed. Kara's eyes closed when she thought of it. She recalled her last moment before she got on the ship, the towers falling, and architecture in Jax-Ur square crumbling to dust when she left the planet.
"We're almost done, just hang in there tight," Lara said and Kara felt herself shiver a little bit more. "You're in almost optimal health."
"Just almost?" Kara asked.
"A few days of a steady diet and yellow sunlight, and you'll be back to normal in no time," Lara told Kara and the blonde slid off of the table.
Claire looked at her cousin. "Maybe we should get some clothes for you?"
Kara was taken off guard by this. A slight smile spread over her face.
"Why, am I distracting you?" Kara asked, not able to help tease her cousin.
Lara smiled, Kara and Clara reminded her of herself and Alura. She wasn't sure if that was really a good thing or not.
Kara amused herself with the look on her cousin's face, but she figured that she had to get some clothes on.
"There an extra set in that dresser," Claire told her. "It should fit you."
Kara brushed past Jean and she stared at her for a second.
'Something familiar,' Kara thought, Jean resembled some kind of legend that she heard about one time, but she couldn't really put her finger on it.
It slowly drove her nuts to think about it. Kara looked at the drawer, looking at the underwear. She frowned and there was a sense that there were questions to be asked of her.
"And if you wanted to know, I had clothes on before I left, but they disintegrated upon entry," Kara said without missing a beat. She slipped on a red sweater and a pair of jeans. They did fit her.
It would have to do for now until the point where she could get something else on. She twirled her finger with a sigh.
"How did your clothes go, but the ship didn't?" Jean asked.
Kara frowned deeply when she racked her mind for a logical explanation.
"I don't really know," Kara admitted, and she grew red around the cheeks.
The ship knocking itself in stasis mode for so long was also a mystery to her. It was only supposed to keep her in stasis until she landed.
What she didn't intend to happen was half of the planet being brought down with her ship and Clara's as well. She really was glad her cousin was here and as healthy as she hoped Clara would be.
Kara reminded herself that if they weren't born from natural pregnancy, they might not have survived the trip even with the security measures around their ships. That was another quality of their unique Kryptonian biology that sustained them.
Alura was right this whole time about that theory. Kara would miss her mother the most out of everyone. She was her best friend in addition to her mother.
The blonde barely paid attention to what she was doing and she ran head long into Harry.
"Whoa, easy there," Harry said and she held her up.
"Oh, you're back," Kara said breathlessly, feeling his strong grip hold her upright.
"And I see that you're dressed," Harry said to her, holding her up. "Can you stand on your own?"
"Yeah, guess coming out of stasis took more out of me than I thought," Kara said and Harry lead over to a bedroom area.
"Yellow sunlight gets filtered through the Fortress naturally, except for the training area, which is red for obvious reasons," Lara remarked.
"Well it's no worse than Harry's method of training," Clara said and Harry raised an eyebrow in amusement. "You know, strap me with blue Kryptonite and throw me in with ten rounds against Wolverine."
Jean snickered at the thought of that, until Claire's gaze locked onto hers.
"You learned how to defend yourself without powers eventually, didn't you?" Harry asked her and Kara giggled when she held Harry's arm.
"Oh I did, but that's not really the point," Claire said and she could see her cousin, technically older cousin even though she was younger now, getting really cozy with Harry.
"I know a little bit about self-defense, not much, my lessons just started a few months before everything went to hell," Kara said, and she walked into the bedroom with generous assistance from Harry.
Kara saw the bed and she took in the entire room. A lump rose in her throat that she swallowed. It reminded her a bit of her room back in her home on Kandor. At least before Kandor vanished while she was visiting a friend outside of the city.
"Sorry, I can change it if you want me to," Lara offered her gently.
"No, it's okay," Kara said in a tired voice.
She sat down on the bed, with Claire sitting on her other side. Her cousin squeezed her shoulder.
"So we got the Kryptonite cleaned out?" Claire asked Harry.
"Cleaned out and decontaminated," Harry confirmed to her.
Claire let out a sigh of relief. She dealt with meteor mutants for half of her life and the last thing she wanted to do was deal with them at least once week for the next five years. It got rather tiresome after a long time.
"So, this has been an interesting day," Claire said and she could see Kara leaning over Harry's shoulder. She was about to say something to her cousin, but there was only one problem.
She drifted off to sleep, and was drooling on Harry's shoulder.
"Well, I hope that new shirt doesn't cost that much," Claire whispered in Harry's ear.
'I'm sure Harry can wipe his ass with something like that,' Jean chimed in, making sure to link their minds up.
'Not exactly how I would have put it, but essentially true in principle,' Harry thought back to Jean and she looked smug.
'Was it just me, or did she look like she recognized me and you?' Jean asked.
'We're going to have to ask her about that when she was in more sound mind,' Harry thought back to her. 'Speaking of sound mind…..'
'If you must know, I had another episode when she came out of the box,' Jean thought and she gave a lengthy sigh. 'But you have to understand, it was only because I heard her thoughts that she had when she saw her home planet destroyed.'
Harry thought that it was best to let Jean off of the hook, for now. 'Very well.'
'I'm telling the truth,' Jean told him, folding her arms in frustration.
Perhaps she tried to convince herself as much as she convinced Harry.
'I know, Jean,' Harry thought to her.
He thought of other potential complications. Kara's alarm sent a signal to people on Earth. He really hoped that it didn't pick up to someone from the stars. Krypton had many enemies, who would like nothing better than to extinguish any survivors.
Harry made plans to deal with that when it came. He had plans for ages really. It was just a matter of survival.
The Kree Empire regarded Earth as nothing more than a speck of dust in the grander universe. Seconds later they noticed a blip off in the distance.
"It's a beacon, and it's Kryptonian," one of the members of the Kree whispered and he could barely contain his excitement.
It was known that a group of Kryptonians who became the Kree left the planet centuries ago. They felt that the Council held back their evolution. The Council considered them to be freaks and misfits even though they were the superior evolution of the rest of the Kryptonain race. Their technology was better at breeding the perfect soldiers than Krypton's ever was.
One could whisper that their greatest soldier was one that was born through a natural pregnancy but that was not something that the Kree thought about. It was based mostly upon propaganda and lies, even though he had his supporters within the empire.
Krypton died, and it was a happy day, but there were some who still harbored a few survivors.
"It's the mudball known as Earth," a harsh Kree stated. He clutched his fist around a giant hammer that would smash down upon anything that got in his way.
"Earth?" one of them questioned.
"Yes, it's the mudball known as Earth," another one agreed and they braced themselves for what would come next. "Grand Accuser, what should we do?"
"We will eliminate these rejects, and then punish Earth for harboring them," Ronan the Accusor said. "Supreme Intelligence, that is my recommendation, all I require is the order from you."
"Grand Accuser I accept your proposal, and recommend that any and all Kryptonian technology is seized as property of the Kree empire, and their survivors be brought to trial, along with anyone who harbors them," the Supreme Intelligence said in a robotic and detached voice.
"Thank you grand one, it will be done," Ronan said, an ugly scar on his face visible.
He had been at this game for a long time. He was barely more than a boy and a soldier in the Kree army when he receives this scar. They tried to take control of the Kryptonian colony known as Argo which had been in Kree territory.
The Kree failed on that day, and before they could plan their revenge, Krypton blew up. Any colonists that were on Argo perished thanks to the backfire, their planet freezing over.
It was a fitting end to them, Ronan had to admit. Even though he regretted not obtaining any revenge but it was always as the saying went, and it was that it was never too late.
Ronan waited for the embrace of victory to greet him. The Accuser prepared to personally lead the charge to Earth.
Krypton perished today. The last survivors would not be that way much longer.