They brought him outside into a secured open area, light trees at the edges, military vehicles forming a periter that was more symbolic than practical at this point.
Then the sound ca. A deep atmospheric shift, the kind that had no reference point in anything built on Earth. The sky darkened in one spot directly above and the ship ca through it, arriving rather than landing, hull geotry that still didn't make sense up close.
It stopped six feet off the ground and stayed there.
The hull opened.
Black exoskeleton suits first. Four of them, moving with the economy of people who had been soldiers their entire engineered lives. Then a fifth figure ca through who moved differently.
A woman.
She walked ahead of the others, eyes already moving across the periter, reading it, dismissing it.
Then her eyes found Daniel.
They stopped.
"People of Earth," Faora said, her voice carrying flat across the clearing. "You have been wise to et our demands."
She walked straight to Daniel without stopping and the escort fell in around him, black exoskeleton suits moving into position, and Daniel went with them without a word or a look back.
The hull closed behind them.
The ship rose and was gone.
Inside the ship Daniel looked around with genuine interest. Clean lines. Kryptonian engineering everywhere, functional and cold, nothing built for comfort because comfort was never the point.
The air had a different composition to it, processed, carrying the faint tallic edge of recycled atmosphere.
He rolled his neck and looked up at the ceiling and then at the walls and then at the soldiers standing at intervals throughout the corridor.
"Nice ship," Daniel said to no one in particular.
Nobody responded.
"The lighting could use so work," he added, walking with them down the corridor. "Very aggressive. Has anyone considered sothing warr. A softer tone. Better for morale."
Still nothing.
"The floor is good though," Daniel said, looking down. "Very solid. I appreciate that."
Faora turned around. "Enough."
Daniel looked at the ceiling and noted the ventilation system made an interesting sound.
"I said enough," Faora said.
"I heard you," Daniel said. "I'm just observing."
She faced forward and didn't speak to him again for the rest of the walk.
The ship docked into the larger vessel in the space with a deep chanical lock and Daniel was escorted through corridors that got wider and colder until the doors ahead opened into the main chamber.
Zod stood with his back to the entrance, looking out at open space through the viewport, hands clasped behind him.
He turned when Daniel walked in.
"Kal-El," Zod said. "I am General Zod."
He walked forward slowly, hands clasped behind his back.
"Your father and I were friends once. Before we were adversaries."
He stopped and looked at him for a mont.
"Jor-El was a great man. He saw what was coming before anyone else did and tried to stop it his way. I tried to stop it mine. Different visions. Different thods." He paused.
"Neither of us saved our planet."
"But Krypton does not have to stay dead," Zod continued.
"Before the end your father took the Codex. The genetic blueprint of every Kryptonian bloodline that ever existed. The entire future of our civilization. He hid it sowhere on Earth before he sent you here."
He stepped closer.
"I have no interest in conflict Kal-El. I want what your father took. Nothing more. Give us the Codex, help us find it, and I will forgive everything. Your years among these humans. Your father's betrayal. All of it gone." He let that settle.
"You are the last son of Krypton. Your place is with your people not on a planet that was never yours to begin with. Co with us. Help us rebuild what was lost."
"Zod," Daniel finally said.
Faora stepped forward. "You will address him as General Zod."
Daniel didn't look at her.
"The thing is," Daniel said, still smiling at Zod, "I'm not Kal-El. And you just walked into a trap I laid for you."
The entire chamber went still as that landed. If he wasn't Kryptonian then what was he doing on this ship breathing atmosphere simulated for Kryptonian biology without any visible discomfort.
Nobody had an answer for that.
Before anyone could form one Daniel was already behind the nearest soldier, his hand going straight through the exoskeleton and into his chest, pulling the heart out clean.
The soldier dropped.
The chamber exploded.
Three Kryptonians went for their weapons simultaneously, shots firing at Daniel from every angle, the sound deafening in the enclosed space.
Daniel wasn't where any of them landed.
He appeared behind the second soldier and drove his hand through his back, sa as the first, sa result. The body hit the floor and the scream that followed ca from the Kryptonian beside him watching it happen.
"Open fire!" Faora commanded, her voice cutting through the chaos. "All of you, now!"
Every weapon in the chamber turned on the spot Daniel had just been standing.
He was already sowhere else.
"Without yellow sun radiation," Daniel said from behind a third soldier, his hand already moving, "you're just stronger than humans."
The third one went down.
"Not invincible."
Faora charged him directly, faster than the others, closing the distance in a second and driving her fist toward his face with everything behind it.
Daniel caught her fist in his hand and stopped it completely.
She looked at her own fist in his grip, then at his face.
"Hello Faora," Daniel said.
*****
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