Starman v2 79-80
- NB: This summary refers solely to the events involving the future Thom Kallor, except to the extent needed for context.
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Contents
Starman v2 #79: 1951, Part Three: --Why?
After fighting alongside his brother and father for the last time, and having inadvertantly ensured his own birth before seeing his brother snatched back to the moment of his death, Jack Knight wonders what he should do, while trapped years before his own birth with no means of returning home.
The question is abruptly answered when a transparent globe appears in front of him with a blinding flash, and a figure in an all-covering starfield-effect costume inside asks if he remembers him, before stepping out and informing him he's there to take him home.
Starman v2 #80: Arrivederci, Bon Voyage, Goodbye
After a trip lasting just a moment, the two Starmen arrive in the present day Opal City, and the masked figure confirms in answer to Jack's question that he is Thom Kallor - an older Thom Kallor, from a future where he returned to the 21st Century to become Danny Blaine, as the Shade had previously suggested - though he's shocked at Jack's suggestion that he was reincarnated.
What he also doesn't know is if the future Jack experiences will lead to the one Thom himself lived:
- Jack: "But everything will happen just like the Shade said?"
- Thom: "I'll return from the 31st Century, yes. But whether your future leads to me, I can't say. I'm only one posisble future after all."
- Jack: "Huh"?
- Thom: "The future isn't a straight line from the present like the present is to the past. The way ahead has many forks. Potential choices. Unsung songs. Unspoken verse. All awaiting the moment when 'what might be' has become 'what is'."
- Jack: "So... you're saying... I'm not sure what you're saying."
- Thom: "For all I know in other possible futures, Thom Kallor died serving in the Legion. Or he turned evil. Or he was simply different enough in his personality he doesn't return to the past and become Starman. But in the future that's mine, I did."
He then prepares to depart, to return to the death that had scared him so as a teenager, on what will be the next day to him. Jack, shocked, asks if he can't change things if he knows. Instead, having reassured Jack that he didn't regret starting again - it was as if he'd had two lives - he unmasks briefly to reveal a scarred, aged face topped with short grey hair, and says he had lived more than enough, then says goodbye and leaves.
Shortly after, Jack Knight retires as Starman.
Covers
Starman v2 #79 cover, art by Andrew Robinson
Starman v2 #80 cover, art by Andrew Robinson
