I have been thinking about this chapter all day, Rac. Because it touches on one of the most interesting and also upsetting subjects I know - the morality of killing.

I think that the killing of another person is really a horrible thing, a thing that should be avoided if it is at all possible. To me, the "unnecessary" killing of another person is always a bad thing. This is why I am almost always against the death penalty. If a person can be controlled and rendered harmless through incarceration, then I don't think anything is gained by executing that person. Instead, the surrounding society in general and the people carrying out the execution in particular become harmed by it. Because I do think that any person who has deliberately killed or actively or willingly enabled the killing of another person is in some way morally deformed by that act.

However, as you showed us in your story, Rac, sometimes incarceration is not enough to prevent a dangerous individaul from doing more harm. It was not enough to control Nor by locking him up in a jail. His mother and her followers were able to set in motion a plan to free Nor which in turn led to grievous harm for a lot of people.

Sometimes it is necessary to kill. And it is not always possible to judge how long you should keep giving a person the benefit of the doubt. If Clark had killed Nor sooner, all the death and horror in the recent chapters of your story may not have happened.

However, would it have been right for Clark to kill Nor just to be on the safe side, just because catastrophe might ensue if he didn't kill off his enemy once and for all? Clark doesn't know the future. If he wants to be safe rather than sorry evey time he deals with an enemy, he should really kill all his adversaries. But what sort of man would Clark become if he routinely killed his enemies?

Once I read an abridged version of Robert Louis Stephenson's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. I'm sure you all remember that Mr. Hyde is Dr. Jekyll's inner demon, whom he releases by taking a drug. The way I remember the story, Mr. Hyde is at first a very short, small, almost dwarf-like man. However, as Dr. Jekyll lets Mr. Hyde out again, allowing him to do more and more evil deeds, Mr. Hyde literally grows. As he does, it becomes harder and harder for Dr. Jekyll to "contain" Mr. Hyde, to maintain his normal persona. Dr. Jekyll begins to spontaneously change into Mr. Hyde. He has used his evil side so much that this aspect of him has grown to the point that it is taking over. Dr. Jekyll has literally become Mr. Hyde.

If Clark were to routinely kill his enemies, in order to make sure they don't cause any problems in the future, he himself would become a ruthless, heartless killer, as bad as any of his enemies. That is why I insist that killing is a bad thing in itself, something that should be avoided as long as it is at all possible.

But sometimes it isn't possible to avoid it. Sometimes you have to kill. And Clark had to kill Nor. He had no choice.

But it is horrible and devastating to see the amount of damage this act of killing has done to Clark. Although he doesn't compare himself with Robert Louis Stephenson's literary characters, he is nevertheless thinking of himself as a sort of Dr. Jekyll, who has let out his own Mr. Hyde only once, but who has nevertheless been taken over by his own inner beast. The way you describe Clark's mental agony, he seems to believe that he has completely lost the good and righteous man that he used to be. He has lost his self-respect. When he spoke so cruelly to Talan, I thought he was a man who despised himself, and therefore he also despised others.

This paragraph is heartbreaking and absolutely chilling:

Quote
Clark said nothing, unsurprised that yet again, another friend, another person he respected, thought that the turmoil and anguish tearing him apart at the seams, stemmed from simple guilt over having killed Nor. What would they think of him if they knew the truth? He couldn't do that to Tao Scion. The older man would be heartbroken to know that his friends' son was not the noble man Tao Scion thought he was. He finally looked up to meet the doctor's sympathetic gaze. "I'm going to be late," Clark said simply before turning to walk away.
Clark can't tell anyone about his own agony. He can't say to Tao Scion or Talan, "Look, I hate myself, because I think I have become a monster." Instead he appears to want to literally flee from New Krypton as soon as he can. And then he is going to go straight home to Lois - and dump his inner Mr. Hyde in her lap. Oh, wow. Lois probably needs to see Dr. Friskins a few more times, but the person who is really going to need a shrink is Clark. Or will Lois and the Kents be able to straighten Clark out on their own?

There is also the question of how much Clark really can be straightened out. He can't become "himself" again, I'm sure of it. Can he rise from the ashes as a new, better Clark? Or will he become one of those men who are permanently traumatized by the horrors they lived through while fighting a war?

As usual, this was an amazing chapter. So many other things were great about it...Lok Sim and Enza, the burial of Faral which brought tears to my eyes, and the adorable scene with Lois, Jimmy and Jon.

This is such a great story, Rac. So thoughtful, so philosophical, so charged with pain and despair and hope against all hope.

Ann