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“May I have a moment of privacy with my wife?”

“No, you may not. Who knows what secret information you two might exchange?”

Jor-El placed his palm flat against the wall of interlocked crystal; behind the blurry barrier, Lara did the same. “Be strong, Lara. We’ll get through this.”

“Tell me what’s happening out there. Is Argo City safe?”

Koll-Em grabbed his shoulder and pulled him away. “She doesn’t need to know all that.” The Sapphire Guard began to manhandle Jor-El back out.

“I love you!” he called to her.

Lara’s voice vibrated through the facets. “Do what you have to, Jor-El!” She pressed herself against the crystal barrier, but he couldn’t see her clearly.

He longed to look at her face, to touch her. “I don’t intend for my child to be born inside a cell.”

“Then you’d better help this war end very soon,” Koll-Em said.

The fear and suspicion that permeated Kryptonopolis now worked in Jor-El’s favor. He went about his plans, feigning bold confidence; any furtiveness would only invite suspicion, and he had no intention of explaining himself.

The new devices he had secretly assembled were simple enough, remarkably brilliant in fact. He intended to pass along his appreciation to Zor-El—if they both survived the next few days.

In a small pocket, he still held the fragment of a message crystal he’d received from a haggard-looking secret courier shortly before the army marched for Argo City. The hidden recording it held from Zor-El offered vital information: “Others might be uncertain of your loyalties, Jor-El, but you are my brother. I believe you’ll do the right thing with these designs.”

He’d been saddened to learn that this was the third covert message Zor-El had tried to send him. None of the other volunteers had found him, and Jor-El never saw the haggard messenger again. Had he slipped away, been forcibly recruited into the army, or been killed? Every day, Jor-El expected to be thrown into a crystalline cell himself; he prayed at least it would be next to Lara’s.

Moving as if he were walking on fragile glass, he determined an appropriate installation point on the perimeter of the city, another one in the Square of Hope, another outside the main offices. After slipping into the government palace, he measured carefully and found a hiding place to install the last small object in the large main chamber that Zod had been using as a kind of throne room.

Just as he finished, Koll-Em stormed into the room. The man’s pointed face flushed upon seeing Jor-El there. His loose brown hair had a wild look. “What do you think you’re doing? This is a restricted area.”

Jor-El stood up to him. “General Zod asked me to run a special scan. I am confirming that no assassination devices have been planted in his absence.”

“The General told me nothing of this!”

Jor-El let a mysterious smile creep across his face. “Precisely who do you think he’s worried about? You’ve made your ambitions clear, not even showing mercy to your own brother. The General has every right to be suspicious of you.” He pressed his point. “Shall we contact him now? We might be able to break through the interference caused by the solar storm. General Zod won’t be pleased by the interruption, of course, but he will confirm what I’m saying. The call will also give me a chance to inform him of certain suspicious items I found in your own quarters.”

Koll-Em paled. “What items? You were in my quarters?”

“I was doing my job.”

The young man seethed for a long moment. “I don’t trust you, Jor-El.”

“The feeling is very mutual. And Zod trusts neither of us.” Then he added with an ironic smile, “All hail, the new Krypton.”

He walked out of the government palace, leaving Koll-Em fuming with helpless anger.

CHAPTER 74

Like a slap in the face, the force-field dome over Argo City made General Zod’s cheeks burn. He knew that Zor-El and his people must be laughing at him from inside the city. He did not find it intriguing at all. “Bring forth our weapons and blast through that barrier. Show these deluded