go by / CHAPTER 16 ALL

Chapter 16 / Part 1, 2 and 3. 


*



Thunder shook Clark's arrival.

Violent storms welcomed him in burst of black sand, like the rogue waves of seas that churned for milleniums until they became dry dusts that then churned again.

There was no sunlight.

There was absence, only absence over Clark's eyes. He pryed them open one at a time, praying they saw a orange, warm sphere.

Instead, there was nothing. Just the coarsness that came with the absence of color.

There was white.

Bright, rude light.

Clark shut his eyes and laid there for some time, the tingling of his toes crawling up his legs and to his chest. He had fallen and landed among a black desert, and broken rocks.

Fallen from a world, the only world, he had known.

Now he was here.

The land was tretcherous, and ugly. Black dust swirling between one ridge of a risen land to another. From horizon to horizon was an endless valley of death, an absence of life completely. A void compensated with miles and miles of nothing.

Dry, dirty winds whipped at the cuts on his face, sharp stings of pain reminding Clark that he was infact still alive. Wherever he was now, he had survived the great fall from where he'd come from. The tumble down the rabbit hole Brainiac had sent him.

Brainiac. Clark thought, remembering that he hadn't fallen alone.

Blindly, Clark pushed at the ground, bending himself upwards so that he was sitting. He broke open his eyes again, squinting to shield from the torrents of sand that stung from all directions.

He saw no trace of anyone but him, alone inside the crater made from his violent descent.

His father's wrist watch had stopped as if there were no time here.

Only bright, rude white.

There was no telling how long he'd been there, how long he had been away from--

"Chloe." Clark whispered, the last images of her face haunting him. The last, fading beats of her chest.

And now he felt none.

There was only absence.

"No!" Clark stumbled to his feet, sand pulling his boots down with it as he swaggered around, some feeling returning to his legs. She couldn't be dead, and she couldn't be so far from him now. He had to get back to her, he had to save her!

His strong legs were no more as he fell to his knees, wind beating at his back.

Clark crawled to the ridge of the crater, pulling himself to the steep top only to collapse once he saw the stretches of nothingness, indistinguishable dunes of black dust rolling into the blinding white sky.

Clark's chest sunk deeper as his body fell to the sand, wind scattering the dust that collected at the edges of his fingers.

"We are here."

Clark squinted upwards, seeing the black outline of the male Kryptonian soldier, face as dark as the dunes around them.

It was the face of the man who killed Chloe Sullivan.

The winds cleared enough for Clark to trace the smile across the soldiers lips.

"Welcome, phantom." The soldier said, right before kicking Clark in the jaw.

Whack

Clark spiralled down the side of the crater, tumbling violently to the bottom where he'd woken from.

"You're powers are useless here, Kal-El."

Clark spat blood down into the dark, dry sand, watching as it seeped through and vanished.

"You have nothing now." The solider slid down the decline after him, reveling as he spoke, "In fact, you are nothing now." His boots grazed Clark's fallen side, nudging at his ribs in rough jabs. "You will die as nothing."

Hot tears rose to Clark's eyes. Not for him. But for Chloe. Without his powers, he worried the soldier was right. How would he save her now?

Clark clenched his fist into the ground, spun around and pitched sand at the soldier's eyes.

The soldier reeled back, screaming into the gathering wind's howl.

Clark crawled to his feet and tackled the disoriented solider, pining him to the ground. His right fist struck downward, a horrible cracking sound signifying every blow. His left hand switched once the other got tired, pummeling and breaking every bone in the soldier's face.

The blood was unsatisfying, the swelling and bruised flesh as equally meaningless.

But searing anger burned through Clark's skin, every nerve across his body set aflame, and his mind set on one thing.

Revenge.

If Clark's powers were meaningless here, then so were this Kryptonian's.

"KILL YOU!" Red splattered against the trails of tears and snot, Clark's fists beating down like relentless sledge hammers, "I'LL KILL YOU!" Clark cried over and over.

Eventually his arms gave out. His muscles were exhausted and his fists swollen and cut. Clark's voice was nothing more than a raspy whisper now, the wind so powerful that he had swallowed most of the black grit, and had stolen his voice.

The wind moved.

The eyes of the bloodied soldier gazing blankly up at Clark.

Clark gazed back, sand caked with tears in pools around his eyes.

He blinked, waiting for the soldier to blink in return.

He didn't.

"He's not dead." A voice rose from behind him. Clark turned to see the black cloak of Brainiac whipping in the wind. "No one can escape this place. Not even in death."

Clark wiped his face with what remained of his shirt, and stood.

Slowly, Brainiac approached them, his black boots sinking against the shifting tides of sand. "He will not die. Not here."

"Where is here?" Clark asked angrily, fists clenched again.

Brainiac broke his lips apart, thought, and then spoke. "This is hell."

Anger rose again, Clark launching forward to grab Brainiac by the neck. "Tell me where we are!"

But he just laughed, and laughed, Clark's strong hands doing nothing to his thin throat. "This is the prison your father created a long time ago. No one can escape it, not even in death!"

Clark glared into the blackness of Brainiac's eyes.

Everything here was black and empty.

"Give me the crystal and I will relieve us of this place."

Clark thought a moment, and then replied. "I don't have it. It's lost."

"Lost?" Brainiac countered, his computerized voice failing to hide his concern.

"Yes, lost." Clark thought again, and then smiled. He noted the change in Brainiac's expression, one of fear. That told Clark a lot of things. It told him exactly how important that crystal was to Brainiac. How he had clung to Clark to pry it from his hands before they descended here, how Brainiac had followed him to hell for it. The desperation in Brainiac's eyes now told him that he wouldn't leave without it. That, atleast, was good news for Clark. He may not be able to help Chloe now, but keeping the Kryptonian's away from her and everyone else back home might be the only way to help. "That's right, it's gone. Lost. Good luck looking for it among the endless grains of sand!"

"You must tell me where it is!" Brainiac warned, his eyes darkening even more.

"I told you, I don't know where it is. And even if I had it, you'd have to pry it from my dead hands before I'd give it to you."

"I've already explained that you cannot die here."

"Fine," Clark resigned, applying more pressure to Brainiac's throat, "I'll kill you instead."



"You cannot kill me either, Kal-El. Not when we are already in hell." Brainiac stared at him defiantly.

Clark squeezed harder, the veins popping from his arms. "I can try."

'You will fail." Brainiac replied tenderly, resting his own hand across Clark's and prying them away from his neck.

Clark watched helplessly as Brainiac reversed their positions.

"You see, without the yellow sun you are hopeless. I, on the other hand, do not rely on such things."

With his Kryptonian engineering, Brainiac over powered Clark easily, twisting his hands until he writhed in pain.

Pain! Clark thought helplessly. He had never felt so much of it without Kryponite.

"Bow to me." Brainiac ordered.

Clark grimaced, black winds washing out the coldness of his eyes. "Never."

Brainiac slammed him to the floor, using a knee to pin him there. Out from his sleeve materialized a long metal blade.

A Kryptonian blade.

"You may not die, Kal-El." Brainiac thrusted the edge into his stomach, "But your wounds will never heal either."

He tore open Clark's tattered blue shirt and sank the blade deep into his flesh.

"ARGHHH!" Blood seethed through the wound, Clark coughing flem and thick mucus as Brainiac tore through his chest.

Long, terrible strokes patterned Clark's chest, a strange design, a strange wound.

After he was done, Brainiac stood over Clark, and watched.

"You will bare that mark forever Kal-El. Now you will never forget your true alligience."

Sand infiltrated Clark's open wounds, searing him as tiny shards of glass. He struggled to look down, but his body wouldn't cooperate.

His eyes fluttered and wandered as his mind blacked out the indescribable pain. Above him, the hazing outline of Brainiac appeared.

"It didn't have to be this way." Brainiace spoke, his voice lost in the wind. "I would have led you to our home, to your heritage, to your birthright! Instead, I brought you here, where the only memory of your father, Jor-El, rests. Perhaps eternity with those who remember him best, will convince you. You can not fight your destiny."

Clark whispered to speak, but coughed blood instead.

"I will find that crystal." Brainiac's voice drifted, "If it takes eternity, or not..."

Clark blinked once, and then closed his eyes.

Time shifted with the restless winds, casting Clark to the edge of exhaustion, but never the edge of sleep.

There was no sleep here.

There was only nothing.

Clark laid there for some time, only there was no time.

There was no sun to set, there were no dark skies that resembled night.

There was only white and only black.

And the between color of Clark's eye lids as he shut them, silently wishing to see the promising colors of home.



**



"The phantoms come out at dark."

Clark opened his eyes, the body of the black soldier laying beside him. His lips moved, his voice so small as a whisper.

"The phantoms come out at dark." He whispered again.

Clark shut his eyes again, tiny slivers of sand feeling like glass underneath his eye lids. "There is no dark here."

"The phantoms come out at--"

"Shut up!" Clark bolted up, his body half buried within the shifting dunes. He screamed in agony as his chest bled, his gift from Brainiac, glistening and throbbing. "There is no darkness here!" Clark stared at the brusied, and bloodied face of the soldier beside him. Clark's chest hollowed, remembering that it was he who had done the damage.

Clark tried to kill him.

"There is." The soldier continued, "When the tides reverse, and the black seas shift. They will come for us."


Clark shook his head, and then shrugged off what remained of his torn shirt. He tore the rest of it into long strips, and then wrapped his wounds.

"They know you are here." The soldier rambled, "They smell your blood. The blood of EL."

Slowly, the soldier's head turned towards him, his eyes swollen shut with bruises. "They long for your father's blood. And now they will have yours."

Clark urged his body to move, and gradually it did, standing up to one knee and then to both. He perched at the ridge of the dune, and scouted out at the many others his eyes could see. They all looked identical.

He doubted Brainiac would ever find that crystal, but the same doubt cast over Clark ever finding it too. If he needed it to return home, he needed it as badly Braniac did.

Eternity. Clark remembered Brainiac's last words... Would he spend eternity here?

"They will come for you." The soldier gargled words found themselves inside Clark's thoughts.

"Yeah, well..." Clark rose to his feet, wobbled as he held his bleeding chest with his soaked blue shirt. He mentally shook off the pain and walked on. "They know where they can find me."





*

Life was different now that he lived within an eternity.

Days, or what was rude daylight, went on forever.

Clark walked across black dunes, his exhaustion and terrible thirst having no end. There was no sleep, no rest. And whenever Clark stopped to close his eyes, he only saw her. Brief images of Chloe's beauty ruined by the last moments of violence and horror.

Clark refused to dream of her in nightmares.

Instead he walked endlessly, crossing one black ridge to another, his footsteps behind him erased with the shifting tides of wind.

They erased the hours, the past.

Clark could have stood still, and had the same result. No one would have noticed. Clark had not come across another soul since he had left the Kryptonian soldier in the sand.

There had been no one.

Yet Clark walked on, choosing to discard the bloodied rag of his shirt a long time ago. His bare chest wept slowly as it bled, and with time, Clark learned to live with the pain.Occasionally, he paused from his endless patrols to remove the sand from his boots. Which too, seemed pointless. But he did it anyway.

He reached a unparticular rock and rested against it, unlacing his boots for the hundredth time since he'd came here. Indistinguishable grains of black sand poured from the mouth of his leather boot.

It was endless.

Pointless.

Clark's lips were dry and chapped from the lack of moisture. They bled as he stretched them against his teeth to scream, the frustration and pain overcoming his attempts to cope.

In the effort to make his new life simpler, Clark threw his boots in no particular direction at all, watching them tumble and fall over the face of another indistinguishable dune.

He rested his head in his hands, studying the callouses that grew on his toes. Upon his chin, he felt the scruff of his beard.

It itched.

His mind wandered, the howling of the wind accompanying his spiraling trip. He thought of home, of Kansas, of the blue water of Crater Lake and the green fields of his father's farm.

He thought of her.

The wind picked up, galing now. It pushed Clark's body to and fro as it shifted violently, like a child with a tamtrum.

Clark stood, and let the wind move him where it wanted, letting his body fall into the patterns of the sand, bouncing from one direction to another.

The phantoms come out at dark. The soldier's warning haunted Clark. He had noticed the wind storms become more violent recently, the dunes piling higher than before.

The darkness was the sand, Clark realized. It was the sand of graves. The phantoms were only ghosts who had been disturbed.

Clark walked carefully, ridges and valleys becoming more prominent that before. His chest hurt much like it had before, his fingers tracing the risen scab that threatened to heal it.

But it wouldn't heal, not completely.

His feet treaded over the fine grain, one after another. and then again.

He did this for days, for what seemed like an eternity, until he came to the end.

Clark peered upward to where the impossible wall of black rock and grit towered above him. For once, Clark had met a barrier. He looked around, trapped inside of a risen labyrinth of black. He had walked into a dead end, his mind so caught up in the memories of home, that he had not realized the turn of scenery. Clark noted that light was scarce here. The sliver of canopy far above him.

The phantoms come out at dark.

"Let them come." Clark said to the black, dejectedly collapsing to his knees. "Afterall, I could use the company." He said lastly, smiling at his owndelusional joke.

The wind was dead here, only the ghosts of howls heard from way up above him. For once, Clark felt the air still, and calm. For once, he could open his eyes, and let in the light.

For once, Clark could see them.

The phantoms.

"Are you one of them?" Clark asked the figure in the shadows.

It's eyes..

Red.

It said nothing, so Clark asked again. "Are you a phantom?"

It was silent, only choosing to step closer where Clark could see its face clearer.It was of anthropomorphic shape, but with green skin and red eyes.

A red cross across its chest, and a long flowing cape.

It spoke, "You have returned."

****
****


...

go by ch 16 pt 2


..



The stranger with the large red X across his chest towered over Clark, his blue cape billowing and dissolving within the gusts of fine, black sand.

"You know who I am?" Clark asked, shielding his eyes. From his bare chest a wound wept bright blood.

At that moment, Clark realized they were speaking Kryptonian.

"You bear the family crest." Red, glowing eyes flicked directly at Clark's. "Are you not, Jor-el?"

Clark touched his wounds, smearing the blood between his fingers. So the man knew about Krypton, and recognized him as...

"I am Jor-El." There wasn't a hint of deceit, nor a falter in Clark's expression. Only his heartbeat sped, a quiet confession to this fabrication. The stranger saw very clearly that Clark was hurt, wounded, weakened. And yet so far he had done nothing take advantage of his position, doing nothing but block the fine granules of sand that struck Clark repeatedly in the face. This had been the only soul Clark had come across for many days, weeks...

The red eyes looked at him longer, and then, "It has been a very long time, my old friend."

Friend. Clark, repeated. If Jor-El had been here before, there must be a way to leave. Jor-El died on Krypton, not here.

"It has." Clark spoke carefully, and then watched as the stranger extended his green skinned hand. Clark hesitated, and then reached out, letting the stranger pull him up and to his feet. It was there that Clark measured how tall the stranger was.

Several feet taller.

He nodded, studying Clark as his long, blue cape fluttered behind him.

"You don't remember me," he said as if he could read Clark's thoughts. "Perhaps," he continued sadly, "perhaps I have been here longer than I thought."

As Clark parted his lips to speak, a terrible, screeching howl descended towards them.

Phantoms.

A wraith like blur moved within Clark's upper periphery in smearing streaks. Cries echoed from dune to dune, like advancing black thunder clouds.

Wordlessly, the stranger spiraled upwards from his position, capturing the black ghost in his fists, thrashing and scraping at his chest.

Another wraith caught Clark's back, driving its claws into his vulnerable flesh. Clark screamed, tossing it away as he fell to his hands and knees.

"Get up!" The red eyes glowed deeper as the stranger continued to fight off the phantom at his throat, "You must stand and fight!"

Clark spat into the sand, and looked up with hot tears in his eyes. Was it possible to fight in his condition? No powers? No anything? The newly created lacerations to his back stung with every whip of the tides of wind. Every breath Clark took seemed to deepen the shards of glass in his sides.

The gusts were worse now, the phantoms appearing to swarm within them.

Clark begged himself to stand, wiping away the tears of frustration, and then turned towards the phantom.

It breathed death, the hollow cage of its body shuddering. Black tendons quivered and stretched as it levitated closer to Clark, its body evanescent, hardly materializing before it streaked across and attacked him again.

Clark took more lashing to his arms, holding the phantom as far from him as possible. Its claws dug deeper into his skin, crawling even closer as Clark's remaining strength faltered. His body shook in the struggle to push it away.

Above, Clark heard the howls of even more phantoms.

They smell your fear, as do I. Clark glanced to where the stranger struggled with the other phantom. He heard his voice but... was it in his mind?

Above them, shadows materialized and descended downward. It would be a long climb to the top of the newly formed labyrinth of sand, their walls shifting like tides of a black sea.

Above the dark canopy, the sliver of white light grew smaller. He had to escape this maze now, before he was caught there forever.

Red light emanated from the strangers eyes, much like Clark's lost ability. The light burned through the phantom's shuddering body, injuring it enough for him to breakaway. Clark watched as the phantom above him disintegrated through his hands.

The red X towered over him again, eyes glowing bright as ever. The stranger engaged Clark again through thought, You must fight your way to the light.

Clark pushed the remains of the phantoms from his chest, staring as the red eyed man summoned his heat vision again, disintegrating several more phantoms in the distance.

Whoever he was, he wasn't Kryptonian.

Clark searched the narrow canopy above once more, and took to his feet, clawing his way up the sand in a frantic sprint.

Phantoms flocked towards him, tearing at his bruised flesh.

Clark thrashed his head and elbows to defend from their attacks, crawling upwards to where the light would bathe him in mercy.

Out from his periphery, he saw the stranger levitating effortlessly, his blue cape shielding from the black monsters.

Come with me. The stranger spoke wordlessly again, gently taking Clark by the arm and lifting him into the air.

Clark held on, veins bursting from stress on his lone arm.

The stranger looked upon Clark quietly, lifting them up and away from the dark hole, the bright white light washing over Clark's eyes once they ascended the horizon.

At the top, the stranger dropped him to the ground. "You are at your weakest."

Clark looked up from his knees, "I..." He choked on the dry sand, and blood that occupied his mouth.

"I followed your scent here, so did the other Phantoms. I have followed you for many tides now." The stranger knelt down, resting a hand on Clark's shoulder.

"Why did you wait for so long to reveal yourself?" Clark asked once wiping his mouth.

The green alien thought a moment, "I had to be sure you were him."

Jor-El. Clark thought again. "Who are you?"

"I am J'onn J'onnz." He said proudly, "You once called me a Manhunter. I was your friend, once." The man paused in reflection, "You promised you would come back for me, Jor-El. And now you have."

//pt3//


Clark hunkered down in a corner of a  make shift tent, its owner, J'onn J'onzz,   hunched over a blackened altar where he prepared bandages.

J'onzz led Clark  to this retreat from the gritty wind. It wasn't much but it was shade. And if it kept the blinding light  out of Clark's eyes long enough, so be it.

The Phantom Zone was his new home now.

The stoic Martian recounted an abridged story of his stay in the  Zone, including the captives and ghouls that continuously haunted the land. He talked of foreign things, about the strange green plague that  infested Krypton, or the political instability of the councils that discounted Jor-El's scientific research. As if stuck in a time capsule, Clark absorbed these  stories, for all of these mentioning of his home world were completely new to him. 

And yet, very old.

"You do not remember these events." J'onnz said at last, reading Clark's thoughts. "Your conscious is clouded, confused. Perhaps you have been inside this realm longer than I thought."

Clark studied the Martian's eyes. "You can read minds?"

"Usually." J'onzz replied, "It is difficult with all of the interference.  I have been here too long as well. The longer I stay, the more I become one of them."

Phantoms, Clark inferred.

J'onzz turned to him with fresh bandages and dressed Clark's arms and shoulders. He left the large wound on his chest exposed.

"It burns." Clark admitted quietly, using a longer piece of cloth to wrap himself  like a tunic.

"It is infected," J'onnz discerned carefully, "Can I ask why it is branded into your flesh? You know these wounds will not heal ."


Clark closed his eyes, "Brainiac did this to me."

"The interactive construct?"

"Listen," Clark redirected, "I have to go back. I have to go home."

"Right," J'onzz nodded, "It must be very dangerous for Lara with you away."

Clark resisted his instinct to ask.

Lara?

"Tell me," J'onzz leaned forward, "Have any of your experiments succeeded? Have you... created a child?"

Clark stared quietly for a moment, gripping the reality of what J'onnz was asking. The timeline was so tragically delayed. Any recounts J'onnz had, they were decades too late.J'onn Jonzz waited a lifetime for Jor-El's return. He wouldn't come for him now.

The martian searched his  eyes, concentrating intently again. He was reading Clark's thoughts again.

"This woman you focus on. She is not Lara."

"What?"

"I have been gone for a time," J'onnz rose to his feet, towering over Clark fearlessly, "But I remember now. Jor-El would never forget the woman he loved."

"Wait--"

J'onzz grabbed Clark by the jaw, "You are not him."


A glow reanimated from the Martians eyes, feeding a stream of consciousness from Clark to J'onzz.

Clark struggled to loosen the Martians grip, but it was too strong. J'onnz' eyes penetrated deep into Clark's as if he read his entire life.

Suddenly, J'onnz released him in surprise. "You are, his son?"

Clark rubbed his jaw, "Kal-El..."

"I do not understand." J'onzz paced the small space of the tent. "Why has Jor-El sent his son to this realm? Has the council been overturned? Tell me--"

"Krypton is gone." Clark said.

J'onzz paced back.

"Gone. Dead. Everyone." Clark said listlessly. This he had been told countless times by the also deceased Virgil Swann and his scattered accounts of Kryptonian transmissions sent with Clark's ship. Lost pieces of his heritage scattered in the wind, much like the yellowed paged of Swann's many journals.

 They had all died so long ago.

Clark peered upwards to where J'onzz kept watch of him, much like a specimen in a microscope. 

"Everything he predicted has came to be." J'onnz nodded slowly, "The councils, the warring. Jor-El sent me here, to this realm, as a fail safe. He was worried he would be overturned, sent to the Phantom Zone by his enemies. By Zod, or even his own brother."

The martian reclaimed his seat next to Clark, recounting it all from a distant memory. "I testified beside Jor-El, that the red sun would not support another generation of life on the aged planet. I had seen it before, with my home. Our entire atmosphere destroyed within seconds by massive emissions of gamma rays from our own dying star.

Grief crossed over J'onnz, very slight, but real. "Everything was lost. Everything."

"J'onzz," Clark asked carefully, "why didn't my father leave if he knew Krypton couldn't be saved?"

"The councils banned their own from leaving the Krypton. Kryptonians birthed from matrices could not leave the star system without extermination. It was a terrible over correction to preserve their race. Kryptonians couldn't survive long after leaving the their star."

Clark shook his head, "That's not true. I've survived on Earth my entire life."

"Earth?" J'onzz perked, "Ofcourse..."

"If everything you say is true, how is it that I survived?"

"You are different. Your father's experiments must have worked; unbinding the birthing matrices and creating a son. The last son of Krypton."

The martian appeared to laugh briefly, and then quickly reclaimed his stoic manner. "Excuse me, but it's just... I would have expected Jor-El's son to be an infant. Not a grown man."

Clark looked down.

J'onzz leaned in, "It is destiny, Kal-el."

Destiny, Clark bit down bitterly.

J'onzz took Clark's shoulder, "It  has brought us together."

Clark's eyes saddened as J'onnz watched, and read.... "You believe you cannot return. That is not true."

Clark lifted his eyes.

"No," J'onzz corrected, reading again, "You are not sure if you want to return... this woman you focus on... You believe she is dead."

Clark bowed his head.

J'onzz nodded. He stood again, departing for the tent opening and to the outside.

Lifting the cloth flap, bursting white light flooded the interior, Clark shielding his raw eyes.

"Come," J'onzz spoke as he stepped outside into the swirling winds. "I will take you to the portal."

Clark blinked, "Portal?"

"Jor-El said he would return." J'onzz said grimly, "But I realize now that all this time I was waiting for his son."



*


Clark used his partial tunic to shield himself from the battering black wind. The light here had no warm rays. Instead it left a chill like the cold edge of steel. He missed home. Missed the yellow sun. Missed her. It seemed a lifetime since he had seen all three. He wondered exactly how the Martian planned to return him to them?

Clark followed closely behind Jonzz, feeling too coincidental that he was following yet another promise to a Kryptonian portal. His eyes and feet both travelled aimlessly, his mind tied partially to the words J'onn J'onzz recited before. J'onn was yet another victim of losing his home, his family.

Clark wondered is he had lost his own home, once again.

"You said Brainiac followed you here." J'onnz spoke from the lead.

"Yes." Clark paced faster. "Would he know about the portal?"

J'onzz shook his head, "I'm not sure. But even if he did, he wouldn't be able to access it. It opens only for House of El.  Your father  safe guarded it that way."

"If Brainiac had a Kryptonian crystal, would that open it?"

"What crystal?" J'onnz stopped.

"A piece of Krypton that was stored on earth way before I was ever sent there."

Recollection clouded the martian's red eyes, deepening them in memory. "Of course. I had forgotten. The Crystal of Knowledge. Your father hid this relic in pieces a long time ago.  It contains all Kryptonian knowledge of the universe. It could also be used to open the portal."

"I can't leave without it, then." Clark sighed, "I can't risk Brainiac or any other Zoner finding it, and travelling back. The only problem is, it was lost during transit. It could be anywhere."

"I know of someone who could help us." J'onzz changed his direction of travel, leaving Clark estranged as to how anyone navigated through an endless desert with no landmark. Dunes shifted underneath Clark's feet for miles until a large rectangular structure  broke the horizon. Large black shards of rock penetrated the sand at wild, organized angles, forming an elaborate , corral like structure.  J'onzz continued to lead the way,

 "This is where Dax-Ur resides. He was the first architect of the Brain Inter-Active Construct. And a good friend of your father."

Inside the structure was dark, cave like and cold. There were carvings on the stone wall, tick marks as if a man had been counting the days. Everything covered in little jagged lines.

J'onzz sensed Clark's internal inquiry and answered, "Dax-Ur was imprisoned by the council for controversial scientific research."

Clark continued walking, his eyes darting around the dark corners. "Research?

"Inter-racial blending." J'onzz explained, "Dax-Ur was one of the last Kryptonians to complete stellar travels to other star systems. He was believed to have visited Earth with your father long ago. Upon his travel he met an inhabitant there..."

J'onzz frowned, "In your culture, one would say he 'fell in love' with her."

 Clark nodded, his thoughts lingering...

" Anyway," J'onzz continued, "the council had strict penalties for "contaminating" sacred Kryptonian bloodline. Thus, any other attempt of stellar travel outside the system by a Kryptonian person was terminated. Fatally."

J'onzz came to the end of the cave, seeing no light at the dark mouth. "DAX-UR!" He screamed, his voice echoing around them. "It is J'onn J'onzz!"

A figure appeared then, wandering through the dark.

"I am here." The figure stepped into focus, Clark's eyes adjusting enough to see a white bearded face. "I am he."

There was a strange way about the man, perhaps the insanity of being locked inside as a Zoner for so long. He moved with a jittery way. A weak, limp expression. His body was old, and crippled. From years of mental decay, and a lifetime of isolation.



Dax-Ur stumbled and then fell to the floor, J'onzz taking a knee beside him. "Dax?"

The bearded man panted, weak and and pale. "Help me."

Clark's nostrils picked up a strong odor.

"He must have become infected with the madness..." J'onzz nodded to Clark, "Dax-Us was a renown alchemist. Bring medicines from the shelf. "

Clark turned toward the dark mouth, searching in blackness to find Dax help. Clark tipped over something that shattered to the floor. The strong odor... it was stronger back there.

"We came here to warn you," J'onzz cradled the older man's face, " The Brain Interactive Construct has come to this realm. It arrived with Jor-el's son and it is searching for a way out of the portal. I thought it might have came here first, searching for you. It's original creator..."

Dax-Ur's old eyes stared up at J'onn.

Meanwhile, Clark's eyes widened, seeing the pool of blood. "J'onzz! Get away from him!"

The Martian turned around, "What's wrong?"

Dax's  arm lifted around J'onzz's neck and yanked downward towards the old man's salty lips, "WHERE IS THE THE CRYSTAL?"

Clark dashed over to J'onzz, only to be too late.

Metallic blood spilled against the floor. J'onzz slumping beside the other body.

Dax-Ur, or the replica of the scientist, stared up at Clark.

Brainiac.

Transformed and disguised as his maker...

Clark smashed his heel against the computer's face... its body weakened by the lack of rechargeable power. Like Clark, Brainiac's power was eventually lost. His cold, dead eyes staring up like blank white saucers. He shook violently at Clark's feet, and then laid enert. His body lazily remolding to its metallic frame.

Clark bent down and held J'onzz in his arms.

"You must get to the portal." The Jonn cried, holding his neck. "I will not be able to help you any further."

"No!" Clark cried,  "I'm not leaving you here. I don't even know how to activate the portal--

Jonzz grabbed Clark chest, and smeared the blood across Clark's cheek. "He will know your presence.."

Jonzz gurgled his last breath, "This woman..."

"...She is indeed, alive!"



*


All of that had been months ago.

Clark's dark, rough beard grew prominent across his face. His jaw hardened and crevasses dark. To say that he was sun burnt,would be false. But nothingelse could explain the blackening of his skin.

Nothing could explain the Phantoms.

It was difficult to imagine why his Kryptonian father created this place. Why an eternity without  life, without warmth, would be a better alternative to death. Here, death lingered on fine string. The remainder of your tortured life bound so tight that the constriction of your soul no longer let you breathe. Clark's blue eyes no longer  reflected  the light,instead shaded by the same darkness that took rest in his soul.

Left behind were the bodies of Dax-Ur and Brainiac. Clark created a mausoleum by collapsing Dax-Ur's  cave unto  his body,and left  the remains of the Brain-Inter Active Construct with his creator,finally  unable to reanimate. It was the least he could do to deter the Phantoms that haunted them.

Clark peered down towards his feet where the body of Jonn Jonzz laid. He wasn't completely dead, not yet. But Clark hadn't heard or seen a breath pass between his lips for weeks. His body in some sort of comatose state, waiting  to pass into next world. Except, there was no next world.

Scars formed over Clark's neck, chest and back. Welcoming gifts from the Phantoms that greeted Kal-El to his new home.

Like Dax-Ur and Jonn, Clark too had been stripped of his home. It seemed, that all the Phantom Zone really was, was a keeper of the lost. Those who wandered in darkness, taken from their loved ones. But there was still hope.

In the distance stood a black tower.

Grim  hope.

"Jonn," Clark whispered to his eternally quiet friend, "We're here."

.

With the Martian draped across his shoulder, Clark climbed the last few stairs that ascended a large stone altar. A funnel of dust swirled past Clark's body, signifying that here too, was empty. But with Clark's presence, the tower hushed. The wind, gone.

Very carefully, Clark laid Jonn against the floor and knelt beside him. "A promise is a promise. I'm taking you home now, Jonn."

Clark walked across the cold slab floor, the remains of his blue jeans tattered and filthy. His fists grabbed at the stone altar, a relic that reminded him of the same inside the Kawatche cave in Kansas. 

A subtle breeze picked up dark strands of hair from his eyes, an omniscient presence lifting it.

A godly voice thundered:


I AM HERE, MY SON.


"Jor-El..." Clark said, blue light breaking open from the heavens at the name,"I am fullfilling the promise you made to JonnJonzz long ago. Please. Let him pass."


OPENING THE PORTAL IS THE UTMOST DANGER TO ANY WORLD.


"This man," Clark looked, Jonn laying so still, "you promised to return him home."

JONZZ UNDERSTOOD HIS PURPOSE WHEN HE WAS SENT TO THIS REALM.  HE IS TO PROTECT THIS PORTAL, AND THE DANGER THAT RESTS AT ITS GATES.

"Has he not done this?"

NO. OTHERS HAVE REOPENED THE PORTAL USING THE KRYPTONIAN CRYSTAL THAT YOU SO CARELESSLY BROUGHT HERE. 

The air stirred beneath Clark...

THE CRYSTAL OF KNOWLEDGE WAS NEVER INTENDED FOR THIS REALM. THE MOST HEINOUS CRIMINALS NOW POSSESS ITS POWER AND KNOWLEDGE, AND ANY  WORLD WHICH THE PORTAL HAS OPENED FOR THEM WILL PAY THE CONSEQUENCES.

"Jor-El, this is my fault! Not, Jonn's!-", Clark screamed angrily, but his protests were ignored by the voice, the program, the faded memory stored within the dusty relic his father had made. Clark felt helpless, more then he ever had before. Tossed from one dimension to another by an extinct race and their unyeilding, preprogrammed demands.

I SENT YOU, KAL-EL,TO PROTECT HUMANKIND  FROM EXTINCTION. TO LEAD THEM TO PROSPERITY. BUT NOW THEIR FUTURE IS AS DARK AS IT EVER WAS BEFORE. YOU MUST RETURN


Instantly, fingers of blue, alien light whipped out from the stone altar and grabbed Clark's chest, slamming him down upon the surface. His blood seeped into the grooves of carved Kryptonian symbols,they too illuminating in unison of Jor-El's command.

The blue light expanded, swallowing Clark's body and mind. He looked behind him, Jonn still laying far away and out of reach. Clark screamed in protest, but all was drowned out by Jor-El's parting words--

YOU WILL RETURN THOSE WHO HAVE ESCAPED THE PHANTOM ZONE, AND PRESERVE THE HUMAN RACE. IT IS IN THEIR SURVIVAL... YOU WILL FIND YOUR OWN.





**


seventeen