The Last Days of Krypton - Kevin J. Anderson [99]
“Like my brother.” Koll-Em’s voice dripped with loathing.
“Down in the crater?” Vor-On said, alarmed. Only a moment ago, he had been bursting with excitement at the thought of being part of the Commissioner’s inner circle.
“I have no use for timid advisers, Vor-On. You are welcome to stay in the camp with the other manual laborers.”
The young man swallowed hard. “No, no. I’ll come…if the rest of you do.” He looked around. His square-cut hair no longer looked terribly stylish.
Zod took the first step onto the crumbling slope. Pebbles skittered downward, but he found solid footing. “Aethyr explored our route last night. It may be difficult going, but if a simple hike is beyond your abilities, you are not the people I am looking for.”
None of the seventeen turned down the offer.
Aethyr led the group, picking her way from boulder to boulder, sliding on loose dirt, holding on to outcroppings. Some of the ground had been fused into glassy patches by Brainiac’s powerful cutting beams. They scrambled deeper and deeper until they were far from the lip, away from the edge and any possible spies. Nam-Ek’s burly silhouette waited for them on top.
Down here, the air smelled of sulfur and steam, foul water and bitter dust. Zod’s hands were dirty and sore from gripping sharp-edged stones as he worked his way down. One tall, loose-limbed man, Da-Es, slipped and stumbled, dropping almost two meters before Aethyr snagged his tunic and stopped his fall. Da-Es regained his composure and brushed himself off. He looked with scorn at his torn clothing, a smear of blood, the scrapes and bruises.
“And? Do you want to return, climb up to the top?” Zod prodded him.
“My ego is more bruised than my body is,” Da-Es said. “I want to hear why you’ve gone to such great lengths so no one will overhear us.”
After a quarter of an hour of climbing, they reached a shelf of rock. Zod and Aethyr waited as all seventeen gathered on the stable ledge or balanced on rocky protrusions slightly above.
“As you can guess,” Zod began, “this is not the sort of meeting where we serve refreshments or adhere to rules of order. This is a war council.” The young men looked surprised; some nodded grimly. “Krypton is at war, not just against alien invaders like Brainiac, but also against those of our own people who would keep our great civilization stagnant, as in the old days.”
Most of the seventeen muttered in agreement, Koll-Em the loudest.
“Many of us quietly disagreed with the entrenched Kryptonian Council, and now, too late, all can see that their fossilized attitudes left us vulnerable. Now that the footdraggers are gone, I cannot in good conscience allow that to happen again. Ever.” Zod saw that his candidates were waiting anxiously to hear what he proposed. “The older members of your families were vested in the former status quo. They felt entitled to a privileged life. Some of them have already begun talk of reestablishing a Council identical to the old worthless one. They want to lead us back into our naïve and helpless ways.”
Aethyr added, “We can’t allow your fathers and older brothers to cripple us again.”
“Of course not,” said Koll-Em. “It’s time for the older ones to step aside and let the more visionary people—like all of us—have our turn.”
Da-Es said, “It’s not fair that no one ever asks us our opinion.”
Mon-Ra added, casually flexing his bicep, “We’ve always been prevented from helping when that’s what we most wanted to do.”
“But they’re our families,” said Vor-On.
Zod hid his brewing smile behind a grave expression. “I’m not calling your older brothers evil or stupid, but they simply do not realize the damage they’ve caused. Not even now! It is time for me to form a new advisory board and take useless variables out of the equation.”
“Commissioner, you’re talking about overthrowing the established noble families.” Vor-On sounded very upset. “I wanted to be one of them, not destroy them.” The young man looked at the others crowded on the ledge. The sulfur fumes were making his eyes sting. “You can’t expect us to take part in this…this mutiny.