Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Lois & Clark Fanfic The Long Road Home Part 5 - Comments

Thanks for reading and commenting, everyone.

Regards,

Rac

I'm glad Ching managed to talk some sense into Clark, and that Clark's on his way towards healing. Love the characterization that, if nothing else, Clark Kent is a man who loves Lois Lane.

I'm really going to miss your NK characters when Clark goes home (but I'm looking forward to Clark/Lois interactions again).

I, too, am glad that somebody managed to get through Clark's thick skull! And I'm glad he visited Enza and Thia. It's too bad he has to say goodbye to little Thia, who's been one of his few touchstones with innocence in this adventure. And it was therapeutic for him to visit the three common soldiers who were wounded in the last battle against Nor. It's telling that instead of commending them for their bravery in battle, he feels he has to thank them for fighting alongside him. And I'm glad that he has found something to hold on to, namely his love for Lois.

Sur Ahn accepted her sentence (it's also interesting that it was basically life without parole instead of death) with resignation and guilt. No matter how sorry she is, no matter how much sincere remorse she feels, no matter how long her sentence actually lasts, she will never be able to undo the damage to property, to people, to relationships and families, and to the future of her people. I respect this society's right to eschew the death penalty, but let's not make her a victim or a martyr. Yes, her husband was threatened and eventually murdered, but there's no way to balance one life against the lives of hundreds of others. Even if the raid had gone off as planned, several dozen innocents would have died. There's no conceivable justification for her actions. I hope she suffers for a long, long time. Telling Lok Sim that she's sorry means almost nothing at this point.

The fact that Enza is starting to deal with the injuries to her body, to her mind, and to her family is encouraging. Maybe it's a foreshadowing that Clark will eventually work through all of his issues and learn to forgive himself. Taking a life, even under those circumstances, would change person. It's a light at the end of the tunnel to see the small steps everyone is taking towards healing.

Of course, knowing this story, the light might be the headlight of an oncoming express freight train. Hope not, but we never know.

This is again a splendid part, Rac. It felt quite hopeful after the darkness of part four. I loved how the hope seemed to come from three sources: first, from the young people, from the new generation. The youthful providers of hope in this part were the wounded young soldiers, as well as little Thia and Talan's little baby niece. All of them gave new hope, new strength and, well, just a new or renewed reason to live and struggle on for the older ones around them.

Then there were old friends, who also shone a light of hope in the darkness. Talan may have shocked Clark when she spoke so bluntly to him. But she probably got through to him, at least so that she opened a crack in his armour of self-pity. Ching managed to make Clark open up even further, so that he could voice his darkest fears about himself: that his belief in the sanctity of all life had been a childish pipe-dream which had caused almost 700 innocent people there lives. Now he despises himself for being a killer, and he also despises himself for not having been a killer before. But Ching counters his argument:

His own logic and self-hatred crumbles before Ching's argument. And after that, he is ready to thank the young soldiers for their brave fight and sacrifice, and he can apologize to Tao Scion and Enza.

The third thing that brings hope to this part is love. Whatever Clark is, whatever he has lost, he is still the man who loves Lois. That is so beautiful. But love is such a powerful force between Enza and Lok Sim, too:

So beautiful.

I am very well aware that this is not the nfic folder. But I would love to see a scene, obviously very carefully told, when Enza and Lok Sim are going to make love again for the first time after Enza lost her leg. Most people who had been similarly crippled would feel physically unattractive. What is it going to be like for Enza? Is her faith in her husband's love for her so strong that she won't feel nervous and awkward about offering her broken body to him?

I would like to comment on another aspect of this part, namely the fact that Sur Ahn wasn't given the death penalty. Let me quote a passage from the Bible, 2 Kings 9:30-37:

This is the story of how Jehu punishes Queen Jezebel, who was considered an evil worshipper of pagan gods, and who was seen as the person most responsible for bringing down God's wrath over Israel. To make her pay for her crimes, Jehu orders her to be thrown down from a window, and then he runs her over with his horses. Finally he leaves her lying on the ground, where dogs eat her flesh. Jehu, who is portrayed in the Old Testament as a faithful servant of God, certainly shows Jezebel no mercy.

Ah, but Jesus repeatedly told the people around him to show each other mercy. This, for example, is what he taught people to say when they prayed:

So should the people of Krypton forgive Sur Ahn, then? No, I don't think they have to. They have a right to be heartbroken, devastated and furious, and to blame Sur Ahn for their pain. For their own sake, I hope that people who have suffered so much can find a way to look ahead instead of dwelling on their grief, but I don't think they have to forgive the person who caused their pain. But if these people are to help build a society of mercy, then I hope they will refrain from demanding the ultimate penalty for the guilty ones: I hope they are willing to spare the lives even of people like Sur Ahn. I, for one, found it very hopeful that Sur Ahn wasn't executed: to me it means that the society that Clark and many others fought so hard to save has proved itself worthy of saving.

Ann

I have to respond.

Ann, your quotes are talking about two different situations. When Jesus told us to forgive so that our offenses would be forgiven, he was talking about person-to-person offenses, not mass-murder offenses. When Jehu had Jezebel thrown out of the window, he was executing justice as a representative of the government. Justice is not the province of the individual, but of the state. We, as individuals, are not charged with making sure that criminals are to be punished. That's the job of the state, no matter what state we live in. Sweden, for example, gets to punish lawbreakers within its borders however Sweden wants, without interference from any other country. And that's the way it should be.

Remember also that when Jesus was challenged by the Pharisees on whether or not he paid taxes to Rome, He said, "Give to God that which belongs to God, and to Rome that which belongs to Rome." Earthly justice belonged to Rome at that time and in that place, irrespective of the uneven application of said justice. Your anti-religion bias is showing, Ann.

By invoking the Bible, I made my post unnecessarily controversial. So let me try to restate my position.

What makes the worst tyrants and dictators so hated is their total willingness to kill indiscriminately in order to achieve their goals. (Their goals, by the way, are almost always to gain or retain power. And of course these tyrants are also willing to torture, terrify and harm their opponents in various ways to gain or hold on to the power they crave.) Nor and Rae Et are that kind of tyrants.

Clark was brought to New Krypton to fight these killers. And he fought not only the killers but also the ideology of indiscriminate killing that they represented. He fought them with his own ideology, which forbade him to kill at all. Ironically, Clark was forced to momentarily abandon his non-killing ideology to finally defeat Nor once and for all. By doing so, he seemed to utterly lose himself. Clark now needs to understand that his vow not to take a life was not wrong or misguided just because he had to break it once. He needs to regain his belief in his resolve not to kill and realize that it has been all-important in helping him preserve his own absolutely admirable morals. For all of that, it could be that some time in the future, he may be forced to kill once again. That still won't stain or call into question his resolve not to kill if it can be in any way avoided.

When Clark the non-killer was brought to New Krypton to fight Nor and Rae Et the killers, he managed to change, by his own example, the way most people of New Krypton looked at themselves. I think it can be said that Clark managed to turn New Krypton into a more merciful society than it had been before. And to me, the court's decision to spare Sur Ahn's life represents just this increasing mercy of the people who were victorious on New Krypton thanks to Clark's efforts. Those who won the war have learned their lesson from Clark. They have learned not to kill unless it is necessary. I don't think it was necessary to kill Sur Ahn. She was horribly selfish and reckless when she supported Nor and Rae Et, but she did so not because she wanted to share the power that beckoned Rae Et and her son, but because she wanted to free her husband and be with him. Now that Sur Ahn's husband is dead, I don't think anyone can use her any more for evil purposes, because there is nothing in it for Sur Ahn any more.

So I just wanted to say that Clark's morals have rubbed off on the people and the society that prevailed on New Krypton thanks to him. To me that is a very hopeful sign, indeed.

Ann

Thank you for clarifying your position, Ann. I agree with everything you said, including the part about Sur Ahn no longer being a threat. And after re-reading my response, I think I was probably harsher than I should have been. I apologize for jumping on you and I hope you continue posting your well-crafted replies.

Oh my gosh he's going home soon!!!!! I can't wait! I'm sooooo excited!

Glad Ching could smack some sense into Clark.

ClARKS GOING HOME!!!!!!!!!!!! YEY!!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks for your comments, everyone. They are very much appreciated.

Noelle, thanks for commenting. Since Ching and Clark tend to call each other on their nonsense, I thought it was fitting to have Ching be the one to point out how illogical Clark is being. I'm glad you liked the characterization of Clark. No matter what else changes, he knows one thing about who he is that is constant - he is the man who loves Lois Lane. But he still needs to figure everything else out.

Terry, you're absolutely right that Clark is starting to heal by reconnecting with people - both friends and strangers. As for Sur Ahn, I find her an interesting character because her flaw isn't arrogance, lust for power, or sheer sadism, like so many other villains. Her hamartia is simple weakness. It's a flaw that can hit a little closer to home than the others, I think, because good people can still be weak. Most of us will never know how strong we are, or what will cause us to break (thankfully). Like Lok Sim, we'll wonder how we'd react to the life or death situation, but unlike him, we'll probably wonder idly. This doesn't mean that weakness can't have the same devastating effects as evil.

Ann, thank you for your very thoughtful comments. To be honest, you give me far too much credit. My Kryptonians have always differed a bit from the ones we were presented with on the show. I got rid of the weird system of nobility (because feudalism and technological advancement are basically antithetical and it was unworkable and unappealing from a writing standpoint) to instead give them a quasi-parliamentary system with a permanent executive. I got rid of concubines and did away with birth marriages for everyone except the First Ministers along with jettisoning a host of other distasteful customs just because I didn't like them and didn't think they were necessary to the story. Their legal system looks a whole lot more like the common law system of the Anglo-American tradition than the weird farce/pantomime they had on the show because well, I know the common law system and it works pretty well. So when it came to the death penalty, I just did what I felt like doing (as usual). The Kryptonians have never sentenced anyone to death in this story. A lifetime of exile and hard labor seems to be the harshest penalty they have (and frankly, that doesn't sound like a lot of fun to me - especially since they exile you to a place called the outerlands, on a planet that is already as inhospitable as New Krypton). I figured that the Kryptonians on Krypton could well have done away with the death penalty since they were an old, advanced society that could probably neutralize the most vicious criminals without killing them. They could very easily have gone the way of Sweden and done away with capital punishment.

For the New Kryptonians, reinstating the death penalty may have made sense, given how hard it was just to scrape out an existence, without worrying about whether you could successfully incarcerate people like Nor. But I think that part of their farce, of pretending they were still a civilization in the truest sense of the word, meant that they couldn't change their legal system just because the situation they faced was drastically different. I think they needed to maintain the trappings of their old civilization, even after the near extermination of their kind and even when they stood on the brink of total annihilation.

What I think the Kryptonians learned from Clark was that the facade wasn't enough. Civilization means more than just your traditions and your history. You can't just rely on the pretense. For all their formal processes and protocols, the Kryptonians were constantly acting out of fear. They were guided by their own terror and they'd lost sight of why their traditions and their way of life mattered.

Oh, and happy birthday, Ann. I'll be posting your present shortly.

ClarkLovesLois, thanks for commenting. I'm glad Ching was able to smack some sense into Clark, too. Frankly, I think Ching takes every opportunity he can to smack Clark, be it literally or only figuratively. They have a very odd friendship.

Since I'll be out of town this weekend, I'm posting a touch early. More coming up.

Regards,

Rac