01. Waking up as Kara Zor-El in space.
"No one can predict the unexpected, including the destruction of a planet, or things like the crossing of paths."
—Kara Zor-El (a soul through time)
The planet Krypton, an advanced civilization in the universe, possessed technology and power beyond imagination.
100,000 years ago, Krypton began colonizing other worlds across the universe, including Earth and its moon, leaving traces of their presence. This expansive colonization was driven by a grim reality—their parent star was nearing the end of its life, and the inevitable collapse of Krypton was predicted long ago.
Initially, the Kryptonians were prepared to emigrate to new worlds. But something changed. Instead of seeking refuge on other planets, they chose to focus on saving their homeworld at all costs. To achieve this, they created the Codex of Life, a genetic blueprint that contained the DNA of every Kryptonian. With the Codex, Kryptonians no longer reproduced naturally. Instead, citizens were engineered to fulfill specific roles. If the planet needed soldiers, the Codex produced warriors; if it needed scientists, intellectuals were born.
However, there was one exception: Kal-El, the first natural-born child on Krypton in centuries.
As Krypton teetered on the brink of destruction, Jor-El infused the Codex into Kal-El's DNA, ensuring that, if Kal-El wished, he could one day revive the Kryptonian race.
Kara Zor-El, Kal-El's older cousin, was given a mission by her father, Zor-El: protect her cousin at all costs.
Except...
"I'm supposed to protect my cousin, and now this happens to me?" Kara shouted angrily.
Two spaceships flew rapidly through space, one pursuing the other, both heading for Earth. Initially, the plan was for the two ships to travel together, but a sudden collision with a meteorite threw Kara's ship off course. Not only was her ship severely damaged, but Kara herself suffered a serious head injury.
At the time, Kara was only ten years old, freshly escaped from the doomed planet Krypton. Like all Kryptonians, she had lived under the light of a red sun, which stripped them of their superhuman abilities, making them as physically ordinary as anyone else.
The injury from the meteorite was devastating. Kara, as she originally was, had died. Now, her body was inhabited by the soul of someone from another world—another universe.
The Kara in this moment wasn't the Kara Zor-El of Krypton but the reincarnated soul of a human from Earth. Moments earlier, she had been planning to watch a movie marathon with her best friend, including all the Justice League films. Now, she found herself in the middle of space, far from everything she had ever known.
"Why am I here? What kind of joke is this?" Kara muttered, trying to process her surroundings.
A sharp pain shot through her head. She reached up and touched the wound, feeling the blood. The meteorite hadn't completely destroyed her ship, but the shock had been enough to nearly crush her skull. Outside of Krypton's red sun, she was still mortal, and the injury that had killed the original Kara was now threatening to take the new one as well.
As her consciousness began to fade, she was bombarded with memories—memories that did not belong to her. These were the memories of the real Kara Zor-El. In her delirium, she couldn't help but absorb them.
Gradually, Kara realized who she had become: Kara Zor-El, a Kryptonian refugee, the daughter of Zor-El, niece to Jor-El, and cousin to Kal-El.
"You've got to be kidding me," she whispered before her world went dark.
Blood continued to seep from her head, and her life was slipping away. But as her ship passed through a distant corner of space, it neared a yellow sun.
The warm, golden rays of this sun began to penetrate the ship's crystal panels, bathing Kara's body in light. As the sunlight touched her skin, Kara's body began to glow with a golden radiance. The wound on her head healed rapidly, the deadly injury closing in moments.
Even unconscious, her body began to levitate slightly, floating in the ship due to a magnetic field simulating Krypton's gravity. In Earth's atmosphere, it seemed, Kara would be able to fly.
As her body healed, Kara's mind continued to sort through the memories of her former self, combining with the experiences of her previous life.
Eventually, Kara came to terms with the truth: she had taken over someone else's body. She was like the protagonist of a "rebirth" novel, now entangled in a fate far more complicated than she could have imagined.
She now had a new family. Her father, Zor-El, was a brilliant judge and scientist, highly respected among Kryptonians. Her mother, Alura, held a prominent position as a judge as well. She also had an aunt—Astra, a powerful general whose status rivaled that of the infamous General Zod. Kara had always looked up to Astra, their bond strong.
But all of that had come to an end when Krypton collapsed. Zod and Astra had rebelled, attempting to save Krypton through extreme measures. They were ultimately defeated and sentenced to the Phantom Zone, a punishment in part facilitated by Kara's own mother, Alura, who had used Kara as bait to trap her sister.
Now, in the eerie silence of the Phantom Zone, Astra could do nothing but watch helplessly as her niece's ship floated through space.
Astra slammed her fist against the glass of her prison. "Krypton will not perish, my dear Kara. You are the most perfect warrior, general, scientist, and leader. You will be the queen of the new Krypton."