After a brief exchange, Alex and Clark Kent quickly reached an understanding.
There was no need for further words.
The two of them simultaneously activated their super-senses—
waves of perception sweeping outward from Smallville,
spanning nearby towns, scanning for any trace of Brainiac.
But…
Nothing.
> "Could it be that our search radius is too small?" Alex muttered.
"Maybe Brainiac went farther—beyond Smallville?"
He didn't stop there.
In the next instant, he released his senses fully.
His super-hearing stretched across the entire planet—
every whisper, every breath of wind, every heartbeat,
interlacing into one massive web of sound.
And yet—
still nothing.
As for his super vision…
that wasn't nearly as far-reaching.
Unlike sound, sight couldn't bend around obstacles.
Even Alex's X-ray sight couldn't penetrate the whole Earth at once.
So global-scale hearing? Yes.
Global-scale vision? Not yet.
> "Anything, Homelander?" Clark asked, brow furrowed.
"I've scanned the whole of Metropolis. Nothing useful so far. You?"
Alex shook his head.
Clark sighed.
> "Then Brainiac must've left Metropolis."
> "Not just Metropolis," Alex replied evenly. "He's not even in this country."
Clark blinked.
Did that mean Homelander's perception could cover an entire nation?
While his own could barely stretch across one city?
The comparison was… humbling.
But Clark quickly pushed that thought aside,
refocusing on the mission.
> "Then it's up to you, Homelander," he said seriously.
"Only you can find where Brainiac's hiding."
Alex nodded, saying nothing more.
He simply closed his eyes and extended his awareness once again,
letting the world's noise roll through him like a living current.
---
The Arctic
Amid the vast, frozen wastelands of ice and snow—
The Fortress of Solitude opened once more.
Inside the crystalline structure, a solitary figure stood among countless glowing shards—
Brainiac, alive and unbroken.
One of his mechanical hands was buried deep in a crystal console,
his eyes flashing with endless streams of shifting data.
Lines of code and alien symbols reflected across his face,
flickering faster than the human eye could follow.
Time passed—no telling how long.
And then—
WUMMM!
The entire fortress began to pulse with power.
Energy surged from the crystals,
racing across the room like a living tide until it converged into a single point—
a swirling vortex of light and gravity.
Brainiac's eyes stopped flickering.
A look of pure triumph spread across his face.
> "It's time."
He raised his hand,
and from his fingertip, a single drop of blood fell.
Of course, it wasn't his own.
Brainiac had no blood.
The crimson droplet was Superman's—
harvested during their last encounter.
As it touched the vortex,
the light devoured it like a sponge drinking in water.
The air trembled.
VMMMM—!
The vortex flared blindingly bright—
and then, in a flash of energy, a dimensional portal opened.
SHH—!
The light flickered once and vanished.
But in that brief instant, three figures emerged from the breach.
They stumbled out into the fortress—
their armor torn, their faces gaunt, their bodies weary from confinement.
Yet even in that disheveled state,
their presence radiated a terrifying power—
each one exuding the pressure of a collapsing star.
They were Kryptonians.
Prisoners of the Phantom Zone.
---
Brainiac's gaze darted across them eagerly—then dimmed slightly.
> "Ursa…?" he asked, disappointment creeping into his voice.
"Where's General Zod?"
Indeed, the man he'd hoped to free—Zod himself—was nowhere to be seen.
Still, the three who had escaped were hardly nobodies.
Standing before him were Ursa, Zod's wife,
and his two trusted lieutenants—Noa and Adara.
Ursa's sharp eyes scanned their surroundings before settling on Brainiac.
> "You did it," she said, her tone cool but approving.
"Zod was right about you."
> "It was my duty," Brainiac replied smoothly.
"But tell me—why wasn't Zod among you?"
Ursa's expression darkened.
> "Jor-El," she spat. "That old fool left safeguards in the Phantom Zone.
Zod was stopped. Only we managed to escape."
Brainiac inclined his head slightly.
> "Then we'll free him another way," he said.
"His son—Kal-El—is here, on this planet.
Through him, we'll find what we need."
Ursa's eyes gleamed with sudden interest.
> "This planet… what is it called?"
> "Earth," Brainiac replied.
He gave her a brief rundown of Earth's civilizations, its powers,
and the Kryptonians already present here.
At the mention of Homelander,
Ursa's gaze sharpened.
> "Another Kryptonian? Aside from Kal-El?"
> "Yes, Lady Ursa. His true origin is uncertain,
but he calls himself Homelander.
He once seized the Fortress from me—then returned it to Kal-El."
Ursa frowned slightly.
> "Homelander…" she repeated.
"Never heard of him."
Someone of her rank not knowing the name could only mean one thing—
whoever this so-called Kryptonian was, he wasn't from any noble line.
To her, that made him irrelevant.
A minor anomaly in the genetic tapestry of Krypton.
Still, the details Brainiac provided—the power, the resemblance—
were… intriguing.
A wild Kryptonian loose on some primitive planet?
That, she decided, was worth investigating.
> "So there are only two Kryptonians here?" she confirmed at last.
> "Yes, Lady Ursa," Brainiac replied.
Her lips curved into a cold smile.
> "Then we'll eliminate every obstacle in our path.
We'll conquer this planet—"
Her eyes burned with ambition.
> "—and when Zod is free,
I'll present it to him as a gift."
The fortress hummed around them,
as if the very ice trembled in anticipation.
The House of Zod had returned.
And Earth would be their proving ground.
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