Chapter 6: The Cousin From Minnesota
The Kent farm looked different in daylight.
I'd driven past it twice now—once after my transmigration, once after meeting Kara at school. But approaching it deliberately, parking my borrowed car in the gravel driveway, felt like crossing a threshold.
This is where it all happens. The fortress of solitude before the Fortress of Solitude.
Clark had invited me for a "history project." The excuse was thin enough to see through—we both knew I didn't need help with history. But he'd offered, and I'd accepted, and now I was walking up the front steps of the most important farmhouse in Kansas.
Martha Kent opened the door before I could knock.
"You must be Cole." Her smile was warm enough to melt ice. "Clark's told us about you. Come in, come in."
The farmhouse smelled like cinnamon and fresh bread. Sunlight streamed through lace curtains. Family photos covered every available surface—Clark at various ages, the Kents on their wedding day, relatives I didn't recognize.
Normal. It looks so normal. You'd never know an alien was raised here.
"Clark's in the barn," Martha said, gesturing toward the back door. "But you sit down first. You look hungry."
"I'm fine, Mrs. Kent—"
"Martha. And you're not fine, you're a teenage boy. Teenage boys are always hungry." She was already pulling a plate from the cabinet. "I've got pie."
[SOCIAL INTEGRATION OPPORTUNITY. RECOMMEND: ACCEPT HOSPITALITY.]
For once, the System and I are in complete agreement.
The pie was apple, still warm from the oven. The first bite hit my tongue and I forgot every terrible cafeteria meal I'd endured since arriving in Smallville.
"This is incredible," I said, and meant it.
Martha beamed.
"Old family recipe. Clark can eat a whole pie in one sitting if I let him." She paused, something shifting in her expression. "You're the boy from the meteor accident, aren't you? On Highway 40?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"That must have been frightening."
You have no idea.
"It was... unexpected," I said carefully. "But I'm okay now."
She studied me with the kind of attention mothers had—the kind that saw through polite lies and half-truths. Whatever she found in my face made her nod slowly.
"Well. You're welcome here anytime. Any friend of Clark's is family."
Family.
The word hit harder than expected. I'd had a family once, in another life. Parents whose faces were already fading. A home that existed in a different reality altogether.
"Thank you," I said. My voice came out rougher than intended.
Martha squeezed my shoulder, gentle and understanding, then headed back to the kitchen.
I found Clark in the barn, exactly where Martha said he'd be.
The loft was everything I remembered from the show—hay bales for furniture, a telescope pointed at the stars, walls covered with newspaper clippings and photos. This was Clark's sanctuary, his thinking space. The place where he came to terms with being different.
"Hey," he said, looking up from a book. "You found the place."
"Hard to miss the big red barn."
"Yeah." He smiled, but something in it was strained. "Look, I know the history project was kind of a weak excuse. I just... wanted to talk."
Here it comes.
"About what?"
Clark set down his book. Stood up. He was taller than me by a few inches, broader in the shoulders, but his posture wasn't aggressive. Just... searching.
"You got hurt recently," he said. "And not from a bike accident."
I kept my expression neutral.
"What makes you say that?"
"The way you move. The way you breathe—shallow, like it hurts. And you were fine on Monday, but Tuesday you could barely walk." His eyes met mine, earnest and concerned. "I'm not trying to pry. I just... if you're in trouble, I want to help."
He's offering. The hero can't help but offer.
"I appreciate that, Clark. Really." I chose my next words carefully. "I got jumped. Walking home through Miller's Field on Wednesday night. Some guy—came out of nowhere. Threw me around. I got lucky, got away."
Clark's expression darkened.
"The same night Heather Miller was attacked."
"Seems like it."
"Did you see who it was?"
Greg Arkin. Your next-door neighbor who turned into a bug monster. But I can't tell you that.
"It was dark. He moved too fast." I shrugged, felt my ribs protest the motion. "I didn't get a good look."
Clark was quiet for a long moment. Processing. Connecting dots.
"The guy who attacked Heather—the police picked him up yesterday. Greg Arkin. He was... not himself." Clark's voice was heavy with something. Guilt, maybe. Or responsibility. "He won't hurt anyone else."
"That's good."
"Yeah."
The silence stretched between us. Clark seemed to be wrestling with something—wanting to say more, not sure how.
"Look," I said finally, "I know there are things in Smallville that don't make sense. Meteor rocks doing weird stuff to people. Strange accidents. The 'Wall of Weird' Chloe keeps talking about." I met his eyes. "I'm not going to ask questions you don't want to answer. But if you ever want to talk—about any of it—I'm around."
Something flickered in Clark's expression. Relief? Surprise?
"Thanks, Cole."
I nodded toward the door.
"Now. Your mom mentioned something about you being able to help with European history. I wasn't lying about that part—I'm completely lost on the Thirty Years' War."
Clark laughed—genuine, relaxed—and the tension broke.
"Yeah, okay. Let me grab my notes."
The history study session lasted about twenty minutes before Jonathan Kent called Clark away to help with something in the fields. I found myself alone on the farmhouse porch, watching the Kansas sunset paint the sky in shades of orange and gold.
Footsteps behind me. Light, careful.
"Mind if I join you?"
Kara stood in the doorway, backlit by the kitchen lights. Her blonde hair caught the fading sunlight. She held two glasses of lemonade.
"Not at all."
She handed me a glass and settled into the chair beside mine. For a moment, neither of us spoke. The silence was comfortable in a way that surprised me.
"You look at the sky a lot," I said eventually.
Kara's fingers tightened on her glass. Barely perceptible, but there.
"I suppose I do."
"Homesick?"
The word hung in the air between us. Loaded with more meaning than she could know.
"Something like that." She turned to face me, those blue eyes searching my face. "Where I come from... the sky was different. The colors. The constellations. Everything."
Because you come from a planet that doesn't exist anymore. Because every star you knew is either gone or impossibly far away.
"Minnesota must feel pretty foreign compared to... wherever you were before."
A smile flickered across her face—small, sad, knowing.
"Minnesota. Yes." She looked back at the sunset. "It's hard, isn't it? Being somewhere that isn't home. Pretending you belong when everything feels wrong."
My chest tightened.
"Yeah," I said quietly. "It is."
"Clark tries to understand. Martha and Jonathan are wonderful. But they've been here their whole lives. They don't know what it's like to—" She stopped herself. Shook her head. "I'm sorry. I don't know why I'm telling you this. We barely know each other."
"Maybe that's why." I took a sip of lemonade. "Sometimes it's easier to talk to strangers. Less risk."
Kara was quiet for a moment. Then, softly: "You're not like other people here, Cole. There's something... different about you."
Careful. She's perceptive.
"Different how?"
"I don't know yet." Her eyes met mine. "But I'd like to find out."
[SOCIAL BOND INITIATED. RELATIONSHIP STATUS: POTENTIAL FRIEND.]
The System notification felt clinical compared to the warmth spreading through my chest. Kara wasn't just a plot point anymore, wasn't just a character from a TV show. She was a person—lonely, grieving, trapped in a world she didn't choose.
Like me.
"I'm not that interesting," I said. "Trust me."
"I doubt that very much."
Clark's voice cut through the moment: "Cole! You heading out?"
I stood up, careful of my ribs.
"Yeah, I should go. Thanks for the lemonade, Kara."
"Anytime." She stood too, and for a moment we were close enough that I could smell her shampoo—something floral, probably Martha's. "Will you come back?"
"If I'm invited."
"You're invited."
The drive home was quiet. I kept checking the rearview mirror, watching the Kent farm shrink into the distance. Kara was still on the porch, a small figure against the darkening sky.
[RECOMMEND: CONTINUED LOW-PRESSURE INTERACTION. RELATIONSHIP DEVELOPMENT PROCEEDING OPTIMALLY.]
For once, System, I don't need your advice.
My apartment was dark when I arrived. Empty. The silence felt heavier than usual.
But for the first time since I'd woken up in that crashed car, I didn't feel completely alone.
Kara Zor-El, last daughter of Krypton, looked at the stars and missed a home that no longer existed. Cole Harrison, transmigrator from another world, sat in his borrowed apartment and wondered if he'd ever see his own home again.
Two strangers in a strange land.
Maybe that's enough to build something on.
I pulled out my phone—the ancient flip phone that came with my identity—and stared at it. No way to text Kara. No social media, not in 2001. I'd have to wait until I saw her again.
The waiting felt like anticipation, not dread.
Progress.
Want more? The story continues on Patreon!
If you can't wait for the weekly release, you can grab +10, +15, or +20 chapters ahead of time on my Patreon page. Your support helps me keep this System running!
Read ahead here: [ patreon.com/system_enjoyer ]