Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Fanfic Challenge Stuck back in time

What if Lois and Clark (any season) got picked up by a tempocane (ala The Final Countdown) and don't get back - Say they were dropped right around WWII.

Would they try to 'fix' history, lay low and try to blend in?

Despite any desire to lay low to preserve the timeline, I can't see Clark not helping people. At least he's not in any danger of killing his own grandpa (nor becoming his own grandpa). Not that Clark would kill anyone, but he could, e.g., save the first husband of a woman who, were she widowed, would have married someone else and given birth to, say, Sam Lane' mom.

So Clark isn't in danger of not existing, but Lois is. And both of them could end up in a temporal paradox if they cause things to happen that prevent them from going back in time in the first place. Of course, then you get into a discussion of exactly which flavor of time travel you're using and whether you can get such paradoxes.

There are a lot of possibilities here. But it's very easy to make a terrible time travel story. For me, the number one thing that I need to enjoy a time travel story is consistency. Use whatever flavor you like (time loops like in Harry Potter or alternate timelines like in Back to the Future, etc.), but pick one and be consistent.

If Lois and Clark were stuck back in time, I could see them leaving a message for H. G. Wells somehow that he might be likely to read some point in the future so that he could go back and pick them up.

I don't know if he would change history but I agree that Clark would have to help, regardless of his initial intentions. Lois would make waves in any time. Clark stops a volcano and doesn't make a headline. Lois stops an altercation and starts the civil rights movement.

Clark could have issues of his own, too. If adopted Kryptonian technology was used in the time machine then a signal from it could have been detected on Krypton, relayed through a probe or something changing the conditions that caused Jor-El to send Clark here. Maybe the whole population would leave the planet or the planet would be destroyed sooner, etc.

I agree that consistency is critical. Asimov was challenged that it was impossible to write a science fiction mystery because the writer could always pull out some gizmo that solved the case. He disagreed, saying that it was possible and that the key is to be fair to the reader by solving the case using the tools you've built into the world. In other words, be consistent. The Caves of Steel is the novel he wrote to prove his point.

Asimov wrote some wonderful sci-fi/sci mysteries - I don't remember the title of it but there was one where the protagonist was challenged to prove someone was NOT from Mars. The solution (it's old enough I don't think I need to worry about spoilers), the 'Martian' had written a description of Earth as seen from Mars, describing Earth as being 'alone in space' - Earth is NEVER alone in space.

I know the story--the claim was that the person had thought-traveled to Mars, lived with the martians, yada yada. As you say, the key to discrediting the fraud is that the Earth is closer to a double planet than not because of the Moon.

It is driving me up a wall that I can't find the name of the story. I own almost all of Asimov's SF stories and most of the novels. "Own" but do not "have" due to loans. There were a number of books where he paired a science essay with a SF story on the same theme. I vaguely remember an essay on planetary albedos that may have gone with it.

If you think of it or come across it I'd love the title.