The Last Days of Krypton - Kevin J. Anderson [181]
Donodon’s ship was a marvel that even the alien explorer had not entirely understood. All of the components fit together in a pseudo-organic way, and Jor-El realized with a sinking heart that some part of the old vessel must have been a vital link in the chain. The exotic engines could not simply be pulled out and plugged into something larger.
It was a disaster. The expanded ship would never fly.
He slumped back, nearly knocking over one of his tables. Lara didn’t have to ask him what had happened. She saw and understood. “You tried, Jor-El. We all tried.”
“It isn’t enough! There has to be some other way.” He wrestled with dismay and hopelessness for the better part of an hour, when he did not have an hour to spare. Finally he came to a cold but necessary conclusion. He looked at his wife. “We’ll take it apart—put the components back into a ship as close to the original size and shape that I can manage. They’ll still function the way they were initially built. They have to.”
“But the ship will be too small, Jor-El. It can’t save all of us.”
He drew a deep breath. “No. But at the very least it can save Kal-El.”
CHAPTER 87
The red sun of Rao dawned on the last day of Krypton.
The ground began to shake. All through the previous night, Jor-El hadn’t been able to drive the vivid pictures from his mind, knowing what was happening at the core of the planet. For days, the Phantom Zone had swallowed more and more incandescent lava, and by now the singularity must be dangerously close to its critical point.
Jor-El did not give up. Even though he knew the energy drain on the cobbled-together components was too great to accommodate two adults and one child, he refused to accept that he couldn’t make it function. He needed to save Lara and the baby; he simply couldn’t imagine—or allow—any other outcome.
Working feverishly, he stripped out some of the systems, reduced the mass of the vessel’s framework, and recalibrated the life-support controls to work with two passengers. He and Donodon had crowded together in the original tiny vessel…but that had been only for a short flight from Kandor to his estate.
He was willing to sacrifice himself in order to save his wife and child. But he must save them.
Again, though, he could not succeed. While Lara watched, her face pale and drawn, he made a second attempt to power up the internal systems of the modified ship. She bit her lip, rocking the baby in her arms, and she realized what he was doing. “You’re going to stay behind, aren’t you? But you want me to go with Kal-El.”
“You have to.” His tone had a ragged edge of raw desperation, and it allowed for no argument.
Even so, the built-in generator systems could not power up to the bare minimum requirements. A tear slid down his cheek from reddened eyes as he just stared at the vessel, feeling as if it had betrayed him.
“I can’t do it. The only possible craft will be barely large enough to accommodate a baby. I can send Kal-El away from Krypton and pray the life support keeps him alive.” The very idea sounded hopeless.
“But we can’t send our baby out alone,” Lara said. Her voice was almost a moan. “He’ll be helpless and lost.”
“That is why I so desperately needed you to go along. I failed.” His whole body shuddered with the enormity of what he faced, what they both faced as parents. “But would you rather we didn’t try? Would you rather we kept him with us so that we die together along with all of Krypton?”
She shook her head. Her eyes sparkled with tears, but both she and Jor-El knew the answer. “No, he is our son. If there is even one chance in a million that he can survive, then we have to take it.”
“I was sure you would say that.” He had faith in what Donodon’s technology could do, and he clung to the slenderest hope that Kal-El would find a way to survive, a new place to call home, a people to accept him. “We will do what we have to.”
Working swiftly together, he and Lara guided the new, much smaller starship out of the tower lab and onto the lush purple lawn. Constructed of a sturdy