Clark looked down at him, his anger and sadness merging into a tumultuous force within his chest, his Kryptonian blue eyes burning with a terrifying rage like an iron curtain.
He lowered his gaze, listening in silence to the sounds coming from nearly ten thousand kilometers away, from the Pacific battlefield, as well as the sounds from Washington Center on the other side of the Earth… cries, wails, prayers, hymns—an urgent chaos where everyone felt threatened.
The planet was in unprecedented peril.
He had little time to stay here with Soren; he needed to address everything first.
"Stay here and be good; I'll be back as soon as I can."
Clark lowered his head and gently kissed Soren's lips.
Soren's blue eyes widened, as if he feared he might never see Clark again, and he even hesitated to blink.
"Don't get hurt, Clark."
…He, the one who was severely injured, was still concerned about Clark.
Clark looked at him, his anger gradually subsiding, leaving only tenderness in his heart.
"I will. Wait for me."
Clark said softly.
Soren watched him leave the Fortress of Solitude, and at the same time, the healing matrix began its work.
He felt waves of drowsiness in the light of the regeneration matrix, and eventually, he could no longer keep his eyes open and close them.
He fell into a deep, peaceful sleep.
Two hours later, the regeneration matrix completed its cycle, and the light faded.
Soren woke up from the matrix, instinctively sitting up and touching his chest.
The injuries on his body had healed, and the broken bones no longer pained him.
Robot 9-9 was right beside him, its familiar oval head watching him.
As Soren climbed out of the matrix, 9-9 followed behind and said, "Master Soren, your treatment is complete. 9-9 is currently uploading data."
Soren touched his shoulder, looked around, and asked, "Has Clark returned?"
"Master Kal-El has not yet returned to the Fortress of Solitude, but he instructed 9-9 to stay with Master Soren."
The little robot rolled along on its conveyer belt, trailing behind Soren.
Soren pressed his lips together and walked towards the door, "You go on with your tasks. I'm fine alone; my body is healthy now."
9-9 tilted its oval head slightly in confusion, "But Master Kal-El's instructions are 9-9's mission. 9-9 must complete its task."
Soren turned back, crouching in front of 9-9 and gently patting its head, "But I need to do something very important. I have to find your master, 9-9. Can you help me?"
The medical robot's programming wasn't designed for advanced AI responses, and its display flickered with static, unable to process Soren's request.
It simply repeated, "9-9 must complete its task."
Soren sighed.
He asked again, "Can you contact Clark?"
9-9 responded, "Master Clark has not installed external communication devices here."
Relieved, Soren smiled.
He hugged 9-9's head and kissed its screen.
The robot's display flickered wildly again, and it protested in its usual manner, "Please, Master Soren, do not kiss 9-9's screen. This may introduce bacteria to 9-9."
"Do I still have the highest clearance here?" Soren asked.
"Master Soren's clearance has always been at the highest level."
Soren nodded, "Good. Now, have you ever seen this object before?"
He grabbed a pen and paper from a nearby table, quickly sketching an oval-shaped object that resembled two halves of a pill fused together.
He held the drawing up for 9-9 to scan.
The robot's image scanner processed the drawing and, after a pause, replied, "9-9 has never seen this before."
Soren wasn't entirely surprised, but he was still somewhat disappointed.
After all, 9-9 was a medical robot and wasn't expected to have encountered something like this.
He resigned himself to searching the Fortress of Solitude room by room.
With his high clearance, Soren had the ability to unlock any door within the fortress.
He crossed the bridge over the abyss, passed by the alien wildlife enclosures, his eyes carefully scanning every inch of his surroundings, leaving no detail overlooked.
He had to find it...
Soren came to a stop in front of a sealed alloy door.
The door was equipped with an electronic keypad lock.
His biometric signature couldn't open it, and he tried entering Clark's birthday and other possible codes on the keypad, but the alloy door remained firmly closed.
"Why can't I open this door?" Soren asked 9-9.
After a moment of processing, 9-9 began to circle around Soren's feet, "Master Kal-El has reset the password for this room."
"What's inside? Why would he reset the password for this room?"
"9-9 doesn't know. 9-9 doesn't know," the little robot's voice conveyed a hint of frustration.
Soren touched the keypad, his brow deeply furrowed.
His gaze shifted between the keypad and 9-9, then he looked at his wrist, slowly wiping the watch's face with his index finger.
—He had searched every room here except this one.
The fact that Clark had specifically reset the password for this room suggested that he had likely placed something important here.
His index finger lightly traced the watch's face, making contact with the crown.
With a final decision, he unscrewed the crown.
The removed crown triggered the information transmission device within the watch, sending an overclocked signal at the speed of light.
It emitted from above the Arctic, traveling through Greenland, the Yukon, and the Pacific, eventually reaching the depths of the Earth's crust.
He immediately ran to the entrance of the Fortress of Solitude.
The doors of the Fortress could be opened from the outside, and Clark had a habit of leaving the key right by the door—crafted from ultra-high-density dwarf star material, the key weighed half a million tons, and only he could lift it on Earth.
Inside the Fortress, however, he could open the doors with his highest level of access.
He hurried through the lobby of the Fortress, where the holographic image of Jor-El still watched him with its wise eyes tracking his movements.
Jor-El, Clark's biological father, remained silent.