The Last Days of Krypton - Kevin J. Anderson [134]
With every minute, he could feel the comet coming closer.
Nam-Ek stood before the entrance to the Commissioner’s offices, a barricade more impenetrable than any door. The mute’s shoulders were squared, his heavily muscled arms crossed over his chest. Carrying copies of his records and projection crystals, Jor-El approached him. “I have important information for Commissioner Zod. He’ll want to see me.”
Nam-Ek shook his bearded head, clearly following orders to keep visitors out, but Jor-El stepped closer until they were almost touching, chest to chest. “Has the Commissioner ever instructed you to keep me out? And have I ever demanded to see him without good cause?”
Nam-Ek shook his head to both questions, and Jor-El pounced on the brief hesitation. Slipping around the large man, he entered the cool, stone-walled office. Startled, the Commissioner looked up from a map on which he had marked the locations of Krypton’s cities. He drew lines connecting them, adding up numbers—troop strengths?—beside each line, as if he were making some sort of military plan. With a grimace of annoyance, he pushed the papers aside. “I told Nam-Ek that I was not to be disturbed.”
“Disturbed? What I’m about to say is very disturbing indeed.” Taking charge of the moment, he found a clear spot on Zod’s desk and set down his crystals, inserting them into the open slots in a projection device. “You asked me to monitor space so we could be forewarned about threats from outside. That is exactly what I’ve done.”
Now the Commissioner gave him his full attention. “Are we about to be invaded?” Judging by his startled expression, Jor-El suddenly realized that even Zod had never truly believed there would be an attack; he had simply used the threat to unify a frightened people under his banner.
Jor-El displayed the high-resolution image of the steaming, tumbling comet. He spoke firmly, with no doubt in his voice. “This is Loth-Ur’s Hammer. Outgassing from the main body has knocked it into a different orbit.” Next he projected ellipses that showed the orbit of Krypton, the comet’s previous orbit, and then he displayed a new red arc that exactly intersected Krypton.
Zod frowned. “What does this mean? What are you showing me?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” He pointed to the intersecting lines. “Loth-Ur’s Hammer will hit us—in four months’ time.”
The Commissioner sighed. “Another disaster? Did you not also insist that great Rao itself was going to go supernova?”
“It will.” Jor-El did not back down. “But this is even more imminent—”
“And did I not fund a hugely expensive drilling project to release the pressure in our core with a tremendous lava geyser—a geyser that, incidentally, devastated the entire valley of Kandor?”
“Yes, and we averted a catastrophe. But what does that—”
“One catastrophe after another, Jor-El. What will it be next week?” He sounded both paternal and patronizing.
Jor-El couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Look at the data, Commissioner. Have No-Ton double-check everything, if you like. The conclusion is inescapable.”
Unbelievably, Zod responded with sarcasm. “My conclusion is this: Any reasonable calculation will show that being threatened by a comet now, of all times, would be an inconceivable coincidence. Solar disturbances, tectonic upheaval, massive waves, and a threatening comet?”
“But that’s just it, Commissioner—it’s not a coincidence. These things are all related to each other by—”
But the Commissioner folded his hands and met the scientist’s gaze. “This comes at a very bad time, Jor-El. All the sporadic and ineffectual resistance to my leadership is now becoming organized, and several major cities are forming an alliance against me. Your own brother has followed Borga City’s lead in evicting all of my supporters, and after I humored him with his warnings of a core pressure buildup! Does he feel he owes me nothing?” His voice rose as his rant gathered momentum. “There has even been some talk among town leaders of talking military action to overthrow me. Me! After all I’ve accomplished for Krypton. This is a crisis.”
Jor-El