| Synopsis
| - As we begin, council member Mar-Li is lying dead on the floor in his own home while the military bursts in only to find Adam Strange standing over the dead body. Commander Gor has already decided that the intruder is guilty, and is ready to kill him on the spot, when General El orders him to hold on. When Gor protests, wants immediate revenge, and demands justification for restraint, General El reminds Gor that he is obliged to follow orders from his superior officer. No further justification is needed.
Adam Strange proclaims his innocence, which gets one of the soldiers very agitated. The soldier, Lancepe-Sade Vol, gets further irritated when the intruder calls General El by his Earth name, Superman. But General El orders Vol to stand down before he can do bodily harm to Adam. General El orders the military to leave, so that they do not tamper with evidence and taint the crime scene. General El asks Lieutenant Nar to secure the room and get the Science Guild busy scanning for clues to the murder.
General El takes Adam to speak directly to the Council. Adam explains that traveling by Zeta beam is not an exact science. Since Adam cannot control the exact location of his arrival, it was random bad luck that caused him to arrive in the wrong place at the wrong time, making him appear guilty of the murder. When the Council asks his reason for teleporting to New Krypton in the first place, Adam explains that he is there to protest the accord that the Council reached with the Thanagarians. The Rannians have recently been on the losing end in a war with the Thanagarians; and Adam questions the judgment of the Council in reaching this accord.
General El advocates on behalf of his friend, asking the Council to free Adam on the condition that Adam assist in solving the murder mystery. In making this appeal, he refers to Adam's reputation as a "solver of problems". The Council gives its consent.
As the two of them head out, Adam seems rather ungrateful that Superman went to bat for him. Superman earned Adam's freedom, but Adam resents that there were conditions attached, and would prefer to leave immediately for New Rann, his home. But Superman needs Adam's help in solving the crime, and Adam reluctantly agrees to help him.
Superman and Adam Strange make the rounds; heading first to the crime scene, and then to the morgue, to check in with the Science Guild and learn the interim results of their investigation. The inspection of the corpse has yielded some evidence that the murder weapon is a tool used by the Labor Guild to fire red sun energy bursts to help prune and control the thick vegetation of New Krypton.
This leads Superman and Adam to confront the Labor Guild members at work. Kal-El is looking to find and speak to Tam-Or, the unofficial spokesman of the Labor Guild. But General El and Adam get a very chilly reception. Tyr-Van is very verbal about their unhappiness with lack of Labor Guild representation on the Council. As he expresses this, other Labor Guild members shout out their concurrence.
In the meantime, we learn that Labor Guild members are contracting a mysterious illness. General El looks to get medical help for Sura, a young laborer who has been stricken with the disease. We learn that she is a close friend, or perhaps the girlfriend, of Tyr-Van.
Superman's kind gesture does not seem to be appreciated; because in the next instant, things get ugly. When Adam spots Tam-Or, General El attempts to pursue him, but the Labor Guild members assault and restrain him. The military members arrive just in time to watch their general receive a punch to the face. Tempers flare, and it appears that a full-scale riot is imminent. General El takes command of the situation. He directs the Red Shard to pull back. He then uses a combination of persuasive rhetoric and an effective retaliatory strike against his attacker to deter the members of the Labor Guild. Meanwhile, as Adam pursues Tam-Or, he calls out to him, suggesting that perhaps Tam-Or is being framed, and that he wants to help. But Tam-Or does not stick around to hear the details.
Lieutenant Nar initiates the use of orbital scanners to continue the search for Tam-Or. In the meantime, Superman and Adam Strange debate whether Tam-Or fled because he is guilty, or just because he was scared. They consider whether the attack was directed personally at Mar-Li, or whether it was a politically motivated attack against the Council. If so, then instead of calling this a murder, it might be more accurate to label it an assassination.
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![[RDF Data]](/fct/images/sw-rdf-blue.png)