Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Lois & Clark Fanfic FDK: Breaking

Like the others have said, this was so beuatiful, but it was also almost suffocatingly, starkly sad. And I think it is because this fic is really about the awful, unforgiving sanctity of ceremonies, and the utter, merciless rejection of those who have not been through those ceremonies.

In Europe in the Middle Ages, newborn babies who died before they had been christened were sentenced to Hell. If the infants couldn't hang on to life long enough for a priest to arrive and christen them, there was no salvation or redemption for them. Of course this didn't have anything to do with any actions on the part of the infants, only with the lack of the required ceremony. For a newborn child, only one thing mattered: whether you had been christened or not.

In this fic, the all-important ceremony, the dividing line between Heaven and Hell, is the wedding ceremony. The presence or absence of a wedding ceremony means everything here, whereas such things as love, affection, friendship, upbringing, parenting, language, culture etcetera means nothing. All of that is null and void before the awesome ceremony.

Kal-El was married as an infant to Zara on Krypton. He didn't choose to be married to her, nor she to him, and neither of them knew what was happening. Only a short while later Kal-El's parents sent their son away not only from Zara but from Krypton, light-years away. It seems more than probable that Jor-El and Lara didn't put too much stock or value in the wedding ceremony tying the infants together. Indeed, Jor-El deliberately sent his son to the Earth, where Kal-El would grow up knowing nothing about his marriage to Zara. He wouldn't learn about Kryptonian culture and language or the ways and preconceptions of the people there. From the Kryptonians' point of view, Kal-El would grow up a cultural illiterate, a societal imbecile.

The Kryptonians expected Kal to come to New Krypton and marry Zara and rule over their planet and lead the war against Lord Nor. Ah, but how could he? Kal had received no military training on the Earth and no education on the finer points of ruling an autocratic society.

But what does all that matter? Kal doesn't speak Kryptonese, doesn't understand Kryptonian culture, has no military training and doesn't know how to rule a world. His parents sent him away to another planet so that he would have a completely different kind of life. What does that matter? He was born to be the High Lord of Krypton, and he underwent the holiest of ceremonies, the wedding ceremony, with the baby girl who was born to be his Lady. Nothing else matters, and the New Kryptonians can only be saved if their culturally illiterate and militarily ignorant First Lord returns to them, confirms the sanctity of the holy wedding ceremony he underwent with Zara as an infant, and leads the war against Lord Nor.

On Earth, Clark was adopted by the loving Kents, and he was raised to be an Earthling and an American. He learnt to understand such things as English, farming, apple pie, the Founding Fathers, church on Sundays and wooing and courting the girl you wanted to marry. Clark wooed and courted Lois, but as he tried to work his ways towards a holy wedding ceremony with Lois here on Earth, he was frustrated by Lex Luthor's proposal to Lois, his own "death" as he was "shot", his own breakup with Lois "for her own good", and Lois's transformation into a clone once he had finally married her. After that he was held back by ABC who wouldn't let him just elope with Lois to have the ceremony over and done with.

So, when Zara arrived, Clark's relationship with Lois was ceremony-less. What did it matter that he loved her? That he had spent years trying to win her? That she was the love of his life and his soulmate? That meant nothing. Absolutely nothing. Compared with the holy ceremony that had joined him to Zara when they both infants, his love for Lois and hers for him wasn't worth the paper that the ABC scripts were written on.

However, if Lois and Clark had been married, then Zara would have backed down. She would have accepted the sanctity of the ceremony that Kal-El had been through with this Earth woman. Indeed, she would have accepted that the sanctity of such a wedding ceremony here on Earth was so great that Kal-el would have to stay on this world, even if that meant certain doom for New Krypton. Even if there was no chance that New Krypton could survive unless Kal arrived there and saved it. Because the sanctity of the ceremony is everything, and life, love and happiness of people is nothing.

Now consider Martha and Jonathan. They had raised their little space baby as their own son, they had loved him and nurtured him. But now he was an adult, and he no longer belonged to the Earth because he was their son: he could only claim membership with the human race and citizenship on the Earth if he was married to a human woman. He could be an Earthling only if he was an Earth woman's husband. Only if he had undergone the holy wedding ceremony here on Earth.

But he hadn't.

So on Clark's last night on the Earth, when Lois and Clark tried to steal for themselves that which only those who lived in holy matrimony could taste the fruits of, Martha intervened. She called and stopped them when they wanted to do what only married people are allowed to do. That which you can do only if you have been through the holy wedding ceremony.

You have not been through the holy wedding ceremony, Martha was saying to her adopted son. You have squandered your right to be one of us. I cast you out. Do not touch the woman you hold in your arms. And be gone with you in the morning.

Abandoned by his Earth parents, Clark pleaded with Lois. Don't make me go. But Lois told him that he had to leave, or people on New Krypton would die. Lois would not have said that if Clark had in fact married her. His ability to save people on Krypton hinged on the condition that he had not married her, Lois, on the Earth. The man she loved didn't speak Kryptonese, didn't know Kryptonian customs, didn't know how to lead a war, didn't know how to rule a planet and didn't know the Kryptonian woman he hadn't even known he was married to. All those objections were null and void. Because he was married to her, Zara, and not to her, Lois. And therefore people would die if he didn't go with Zara.

Such is the awful sanctity of ceremonies. The horrible holiness of them. The newborn baby who dies before it is christened has to go to hell. The man who dragged his feet instead of eloping with his loved one was cast out from the planet he thought of as his own and had to go to Krypton. Because of the horrible holiness and the utter mercilessness of societies ruled by ceremonies.

I shudder.

Ann

P.S. As if this post isn't long enough already, I need to add something. Ndnickerson, you recently posted an nfic named 'Knot'. Nobody commented on the title. While there are interesting nfic implications that can't be commented on in this folder, it is also possible to think that the title refers to how unbreakable, or how impossible to untie, Lois and Clark's relationship is in that fic. Here the situation appears to be pretty much the opposite:

How beautiful. How horribly sad.