What an amazing issue and omg Lara is a badass. This entire issue focuses on Kal’s time before krypton exploded. How he was always the runt that was pushed back and how he had no desire to rise the ranks of society, instead loving his time in the labor guild with the only people he loved. His parents and Krypto. He talked about the camping trips they would take to the Rao mountains. Which I love the design is like giant red crystal fortress of solitudes all over the place. One moment I love from the camping trip was his parents asking him about school. Apparently his teacher reported that he was writing his own words instead of taking it from the science league’s resources. Kal softly claimed that he can’t help it, his own words make him happy. But they point out this is affecting his grades and getting him into trouble, and when it comes down to it they just have one thing to say…keep it up! They love him and know he is one of the sharpest and most caring kids in the world and as long as he chases his passions he will be unstoppable. That moment legit has me tearing up, I love it. But Kal also spoke about how their most recent trip camping was different. Jor spent a lot of time taking samples and he swore he hears his parents sobbing. More and more since the mine accident be saw his parents distracted. His dad was bribing his work home while his mom was always building something in the garage.
Krypton under the red Sun was always a hard place to live. Tornadoes full of diamonds, burning rain, and sinkholes that swallow towns. But something different started to occur. Farmers crops dying, animals dying and behaving strangely, pearl divers floating to the surface after being boiled alive. “If something sick was inside the planet, it would make sense…that the first people to fill the pain…would be the ones with their hands in the dirt.” But according to the science league everything was fine. Even when Kal started to take his own notes and submit it to the school’s news board (I love that reporter charm breaking through) it would be immediately taken down and remotely deleted from his computer.
Everything really came to a head the day Kal took a school trip to the science league’s building. All his other classmates want to grow up and work there, but Kal can’t understand working that far away from the ground. But things really shifted when Kal watched as guards dragged his father away for scientific heresy and threatening officers. Once Jor saw Kal he told him to rush him and tell his mother, just as he was shocked and knocked out and dragged away. Jor runs home and tells his mother what happened. She orders him that if anything goes wrong to run back home as fast as possible and ask for Sol. This is Kal’s first introduction to the AI known as Sol in their garage. But at the moment his mom has to be an absolute badass as she suits up in the suit we usually see Kal wear in the present day, but also armed with a lava gun!! She legit pulls an OMAC and storms the law guild herself. Blasting lava everywhere and shielding Krypto with part of the suit (so he had a cape lol, I love it) to run forward and find Jor. He is able to but she does such a good job at fighting back the automated robots and shielding herself, really showing the full potential of the suit. Just full head to toe armor with the cape also providing cover. Absolutely beautiful.
All the meanwhile Kal is doing some investigation of his own. He got a log in code from a guard and noticed that as she was blasting through the offices, no one else came. They should be swarmed with guards….where is everyone?! And Kal got his answer. The law guildsman, the klerics, the ruling class of krypton had been building their own starships! It’s finally started to piece together for Kal. And when they get home his parents don’t even have to break the news, he already figured it out. But he won’t do it, he knows Krypton is dying and they are planning to shoot him into space alone to save him but he won’t go without him. They embrace him and te him how amazing he is…but they wouldn’t dream of shooting him into space alone. And that’s when we get the reveal of the giant spaceship they have been building. HELL YEAH! Neighbors, cousins, anyone else they can bring they will. We also see as Lara’s suit reforms itself back into the primary ship. That is so awesome! Lara would love to bring everyone if she could but the science guild wouldn’t listen…and that’s when Jor reveals they already know. It’s all over the luminarium, the science guild have been building ships only for the elite. The story was uploaded just a bit ago…from the law guild office…hahahaha! Let’s go Kal!!
This issue ends in the modern day at smallville senior living as we get a look at an ailing M. Kent begging for her Son. But according to her records she never had any children and the staff doesn’t know what to do. I would think the picture by her bedside with Kal would be pretty obvious. But we see straight from her mouth that she is asking for her Angel, asking where he went, and asking him to fly back to her. This raises so many questions. If Lara and Jor went with Kal then how do the Kent’s play into this!? What happened??