I Won

He-El heard that and could not help wanting to laugh. Then he could not hold it in. He laughed aloud.

"Haha... Father, I'll call you Father one last time."

"Jor-El."

"I went undiscovered for so long because I truly saw you as my father. I truly wanted to save Krypton, too."

"If I'd succeeded in taking control of Krypton, I could have opened up the Science and Technology Institute completely and helped you study Krypton's core. We might even have found a way to prevent Krypton's destruction."

"But all of that depended on my survival."

"You saw the arrogance in me. You saw my ambition. Couldn't you see my selfishness too?"

"You didn't send me into space. I made you send me into space."

"Now that I'm aboard this ship, Krypton must already be gone."

"I won, Jor-El."

Jor-El's face darkened. Just as He-El had said, Krypton had been destroyed.

A year and a month after this ship left Krypton, the planet had exploded. Even after detecting the explosion, Jor-El could hardly believe it.

He was only a copy of Jor-El's consciousness, a program, yet he had felt the urge to defy the original Jor-El's order to "fly the ship into deep space, away from yellow suns, and let He-El die in his sleep." He had wanted to turn the ship around and see Krypton for himself.

Even though it would have changed nothing.

Now, as they talked and he learned what He-El had been thinking, he found himself wondering whether He-El might have been right. Replacing Krypton's leaders, opening the Science and Technology Institute completely, and devoting their remaining time to studying Krypton's core might have prevented its destruction.

But it was too late for any of that.

The original Jor-El had locked his consciousness program when the ship launched. He could change nothing.

That, too, had been Jor-El's decision.

He had chosen exile, leaving the depths of space to kill his son.

It was the last mercy he could offer as a father.

Just as He-El had regarded Jor-El as his true father, Jor-El had regarded He-El as his son. Their feelings for each other had been genuine.

But that had not stopped Jor-El from trying to kill He-El for Krypton's sake. Nor had it stopped He-El from wanting to rule Krypton and become its god.

"I know, He-El. You're searching for a yellow sun. You want to awaken the true power of a Kryptonian."

"He-El, my child, I won."

"The ship has no energy left, and there's no yellow sun nearby. I'll take control of the Dawn System. You have nowhere to go. You can't even control the ship. This stretch of deep space will be your grave."

"Go back to sleep in the Cryo-Pod. Dying there without pain is the only end left for you."

Jor-El suddenly understood why his original self had resolved to kill He-El.

Sooner or later, He-El's ambition would destroy him and everything around him.

He-El, your ambition knows no bounds.

"Then why do you think I proposed separating the ship's systems from the Cryo-Pod's life support, so they could check each other?"

"It was to keep the ship's intelligence from gaining complete control over the lives aboard."

"Did you really think it was just so the Kryptonians aboard could wake at the last moment and decide where the ship would go?"

He-El gave a cold laugh.

He had begun preparing as soon as he realized his father was investigating him.

But his preparations had not been an attempt to struggle on Krypton.

Krypton's destruction had been inevitable.

He-El had done what he could to save it. If he succeeded, so much the better; if not, there was nothing more he could do. But discovering that his father was investigating him to stop him had chilled him to the bone.

He-El had long known that Jor-El probably saw him as an out-and-out schemer, a terrorist more terrifying than any Krypton had ever known.

Jor-El's genes had already determined that he belonged to Krypton's upper class and would abide by its unbreakable rules.

He could not bring himself to defy them. They had shaped him at the genetic level for his entire life.

He simply did not have the courage to break them.

All he had done was selfishly steal the Codex and place it inside his future son, Clark Kent, leaving his son to decide whether Krypton would be rebuilt.

He had entrusted everything to a son who would be raised by humans on Earth.

He had entrusted everything to an infant.

As for the Krypton that still existed, Jor-El would solemnly cite its rigid class system, its corrupt leaders, and their refusal to accept his research into its core—all to conceal his own selfish heart.

Every class system hardened eventually. There were always leaders falling into corruption.

The absurd part was that, by stealing the Codex and taking everything fundamental to Krypton into his own hands, he had become the most corrupt of them all.

He had let every Kryptonian die to preserve the goodness of Superman, who would protect Earth.

Jor-El had put his son first.

He-El knew what the future held. After ten years with Jor-El, he had also seen how the man conducted himself as one of Krypton's elite, and the cowardice and selfishness deep within him. It filled He-El with sorrow.

Even if Jor-El had joined Zod in killing Krypton's leaders, evacuated as many people as possible in time, and thrown every resource into studying Krypton's core, it would have been better than continuing to obey the Kryptonian Council's rules.

Sadly, Jor-El had been a bitter disappointment.

By comparison, Zod was practically a Kryptonian hero.

And Jor-El was every bit the scientist Krypton's upper class respected.

"So you were the one who proposed that arrangement."

"You foresaw this situation from the start?"

"Your real goal was to leave Krypton before it exploded."

Jor-El fell silent, then shook his head.

"It's no use. Even awake, you can't give the ship orders."

"Go back to sleep, my son."

Jor-El closed his eyes in pain.

Killing his adopted son was agony.

All the contradictions of human nature were laid bare in him.

"I told you. I won."

"Jor-El, I enjoyed talking with you."

He-El laughed heartily. Seated in his steel chair in the control room, with stars twinkling all around its panoramic view of space, he laughed at the top of his lungs.

He regretted that he had failed to save Krypton and become its god.

But he had escaped Krypton alive. His greatest goal was already achieved.

Jor-El watched him with pity.

"Mm—ah..."

He-El suddenly clenched his right fist and drove his thumb knuckle into his stomach. His face twisted, his mouth gaped, and saliva spilled out as his throat spasmed with violent retches.

He kept his thumb knuckle pressed into his stomach, forcing his abdominal muscles inward. Then he pushed upward with it, driving the pressure from his stomach toward his chest, throat, and tonsils. His face turned red as he struggled for breath.

"Cough, cough, cough..."

He-El vomited a white object from his mouth. It looked like a fish bladder and fell onto the control room floor.