The Last Days of Krypton - Kevin J. Anderson [104]
Setting aside his work on the starship engines, he found a separate enclosed system, the amazing library database of the planets his alien friend had visited. Here, inside the navigation system, Jor-El could find the log entries of all the fascinating journeys Donodon had made.
The ancient message from dying Mars played over and over in his mind. Jor-El had hoped he would become inured to it, but he kept being reminded of how far that strange civilization had fallen. If the Council hadn’t shunned such explorations, might someone from Krypton have been able to visit the red planet in time, so long ago? Had Donodon’s people been able to do something?
Using the distant early-warning array, Jor-El had already pinpointed the origin of the Martian signal: a solar system with an average yellow sun so small and far away that it was barely visible in Krypton’s night sky. With that information in hand, he plunged into Donodon’s navigation logs, combing through the records of the alien’s travels, star system after star system…. Yes!
In his explorations, Donodon had visited that yellow sun around which Mars orbited. According to his log, the alien explorer had also picked up the desperate message and gone to investigate, but even he had been too late. Donodon had stood alone in the thin, cold air of Mars, recording what he saw in the spaceship’s database.
Staring at the display screen from the separate navigation system, propping the bulky component on the least-cluttered laboratory table, Jor-El played images of weathered rust-colored terrain and fallen cities that emphasized what the forlorn last Martian had already said. Though the continent-wide canals were dry and parched, they showed the mammoth scope of the lost race’s achievements. Now iron-oxide dust coated everything, slowly erasing the marks of an advanced civilization.
He thought about showing this remarkable discovery to Commissioner Zod, but felt a strange hesitation. To what purpose? Zod would not care, and the Martian race had already been extinct for countless years. The Commissioner would no doubt dismiss the heartbreaking message by saying that the dead race was no threat to Krypton and was therefore irrelevant. Jor-El decided to keep this to himself.
When he advanced Donodon’s log to the next entry, however, Jor-El was so impressed, so inexplicably happy, that he ran back to the manor house and woke Lara from a deep sleep. He excitedly brought her out to the tower chamber so that she could see for herself. She rubbed her eyes and followed him across the dewy purple lawn, then leaned against him as the two of them watched the screen that had been taken from the dismantled ship.
Jor-El played the record of the next place the wizened, intrepid alien had visited. “Watch this, Lara. It’s a beautiful planet, sparkling and blue, so peaceful and full of life.”
Though Mars was dead, the next planet closer to the yellow sun was covered with oceans and swathed in gauzy clouds. The continents showed a variety of terrain ranging from frozen ice caps to mountains, forests, grasslands—and cities…wonderful, vibrant cities. Donodon had not contacted these people directly, but preferred to view them from a discreet distance. Their civilization was young and thriving, on the verge of technological expansion.
The people had only recently discovered radio communications and happily broadcast their existence out into the universe without a care as to who might hear them. They played exotic-sounding music. They built tall buildings that scraped the sky. These people were full of energy, unhampered by stifling restrictions such as those that had been imposed by the Kryptonian Council.
When Donodon’s surreptitious surveillance zoomed in close enough to show the inhabitants themselves, Lara drew a surprised breath. “They look just like Kryptonians!”
“Yes, the racial similarity is eerie.” Jor-El leaned closer. He felt an unusual kinship with the people on the third planet from the