The Persistence of Memory part 4: Comments

Wow! Zoom, each part is better than the last. I'm hooked.

Ann

Ack! Zoom!!! How could you stop there?!! I wanna know what happens! Right now!!! Post part 5 now! Immediately!!

The ASU rewrite was so sweet--and it made such good sense, given the way Clark was feeling. I liked the way Lois brought his memory back...and I can't wait to find out what plan she makes up on the fly to deflect a desperately hurt Clark/Superman, as she stands there in her nightgown.

Wow Zoom!
You have no idea how glad I am to be finally registered and able to post!
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What an excellent story!!! I am hooked and in for the long run.
It is absolutely wonderful to relive all the different LnC moments from the different stages of their relationship. I can't wait to read the next 11 parts. <IMG SRC="dance.gif" border="0">
I have to admit part 2 or was it 3 <g> had my head spinning. But your explanation was great.
More, please,
Natascha

I always felt so bad for Clark in that scene. I can't wait to find out how it changes. Hurry with the next part!

Nan

Zoom!!

How could you?????????

I'm pleasantly reading......

Enjoying the subtle rewrite of ASU and loving it.....

So engrossed in your amazing story that I don't notice I'm reaching the end of the section........

And then............

ACK!

When I reached the end, I felt as if I had just finished watching one of those old serials that were shown on Saturday afternoon at the movie theatres. The hero/heroine is in peril, (Oh, my). Will he make it out alive? Will she be rescued from the villain before disaster strikes?

Zoom, please, post the next part ASAP.

Lisa

Catching up. Nice story.

~amac

Ooh, now you get to fix the dreaded "I'd love you if you were an ordinary man" scene. I can't wait.

One question, though. If Lois told Clark that they were in love in ASU, why is this scene even happening now? Shouldn't their relationship have been sent way off in a different direction?

Not that I'm complaining, you understand. I really want to see this scene fixed.

Jessi

Wow! This is great Zoom! I'm just catching up on this and it's wonderful to revisit so many of my favorite scenes! I hope you post the next part really quickly!

Oh Zoom! Great story!

I, too, love going back to the different phases in their relationship with Lois knowing the future.

Keep it coming!

Missy

Zoom,
Don't you have this story somewhere all in one piece!?! I want to read it all right now, tonight!

"Cat Grant with a diploma" ROTFLOL


Maybe a few more pics to illustrate? I do so love your pictoral essays....and I haven't seen an illustrated fic for quite awhile. Dali meets Sman was brilliant.

I like. It's nice that Lois is the one fixing the timeline, cuz usually it's Clark. Can't wait for the next one.

Makulit

Zoomie -

It's been said before, but I'll say it again...

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How could you stop it there?

Why are you torturing us like that...

Please post more quickly!!!

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Zoom, another excellent part. I can echo everyone's comments above, especially how you left us hanging here! I can't wait to see what explanation Lois comes up with for summoning Superman. I'm sure, coming from you, it'll be a great one!

As everyone said, wonderful re-write of All Shook Up (everytime everyone writes "ASU" I think I'm at work ;)). I always enjoy when the Lois who knows she loves and is married to Clark gets a chance to go back and observe from a completely different perspective the younger Clark, and to notice the love in his eyes for her that she was totally oblivious to the first time around. Happy sigh.

As always, your dialogue sings. And I eagerly await the next section. How about posting it now??

Vicki

I think I've figured out the trick; read only until the 'leap', wait for the next installment to appear, then read the ending of that first installment and the next installment up until the next 'leap'. <IMG SRC="idea.gif" border="0"> Of course, I haven't actually got the willpower to do such a thing, so *please* can you post the next part soon, Zoom? I can't wait to see how Lois talks herself out of this one! <IMG SRC="argue.gif" border="0">

Can't wait for the next part!
-Lena

Zoom,
I'm with the others here.
What a horrible place to leave us.
Can't wait for more.
I love the story.
soon please
merry

Catching up with this story too and it is so good. Great to visit all these old memories. I'm looking forward to reading more.

Jenni

Ack! How could you stop there?! I loved the last installment.

MORE! NOW!

Chris

This is wonderful! I loved the ASU rewrite too, with Lois telling Clark that she loves him, and her jogging of his memory. But, like Jessi, I'm now wondering how we've got here, to the 'ordinary man' scene. (Not that I'm not looking forward to seeing how you fix that! )

This part, more than the earlier ones, made me wonder about what happens at the end of Lois's leap. In the ASU rewrite, she's told Clark that she loves him, kissed him, been open with him as a girlfriend at the Planet. But once the leap is over, back in Clark's timeline he's left with the Lois of that time... who, although she had feelings for him, was in a constant state of denial and only wanted to know about Superman.

So, in a way, I suppose I'm not really all that surprised that we've ended up at those agonisingly painful scenes from BatP (I love those scenes! :)). Clark, though, must be totally confused by now. One minute Lois likes him, the next he's pond scum. Then she's in love with him, and suddenly they're back to being friends and - no doubt - Lois looking appalled at the very idea that she might have told him she loved him.

Looking forward to more!


Wendy

Interesting Zoom, very cruel place to leave us have you been taking lessons? I have an idea how to fix this, but I'm not sur ehow you're gonna so post the next part soon . I think these leaps aren't really affecting the "main" time line, which is where these things are happeing, not sure though just what I got out of the explanation, that they wouldn't really affect anything other then fixing the current problem .

Yeah, what Adam said. No, really, Wendy and Jessi, the reason that Lois has to restart from scratch each time is that each 'time ripple' is completely separate and isolated from the others. No matter what she does in each one, it won't affect the history of the others in the slightest. All she can do is hurry up the progress of her relationship with Clark to bring that single 'time ripple' into synch with reality (or what Adam called the main time line). Then she has to start all over again in the next ripple.

BTW, zoom, what a terrific premise! And your execution is, of course, wonderful. Are you going to stop with the TF ep, since that's where the time disruption occurred? Or will Lois have to leap into later moments since their entire future has been disrupted too?

Sheila said:


I'm sorry; maybe I'm stupid, but I really don't understand this. Lois is with Clark in the ASU rewrite, telling him that she loves him. So what, exactly, is he going to think when she leaves and her true self from that time-line takes over? <IMG SRC="dizzy.gif" border="0"> Do you mean that as soon as she leaves he forgets it all or something? This just doesn't make sense to me, great as the story is.


Wendy

Just got to all four parts, Zoom and it's great. I took the changes to each be to a different timeline...thereby correcting multiple instances (sort of like programmatic recursion--I'm such a geek! ).

Whatever, it's just wonderful to see a fic from you again because you have such a great sense of humor and your cultural refs are nothing short of hysterical.

Can't wait for the rest.

Sherry

This continues to be great... I love that Lois got a chance to tell Cat that she was in love with Clark ... even if Cat didn't believe her <g> Actually, I think I like that touch a lot; it's clever. And I'm on the edge of my seat to find out what you'll do with the "ordinary man" scene. At least "our" Lois is in control right from the start so we won't have to replay the beginning of the scene.

As for the time ripple thing ... I think it makes sense but I'm not sure I could explain it Wendy, think of it as hiking up panty hose Even though you've moved up the bottom few inches, the stuff above it hasn't moved yet, until you yank there, too... unless of course I'm entirely off-base Either way, though, I'm enjoying this immensely. I suspect the goal is to get L&C to a point where it'd be entirely normal for them to be pregnant by the end of S2, but I'll wait to see.

Oh, and what's with our friendly tattooed research assistant at Star Labs? I have a suspicion or two but I'm probably way off...

PJ
post part 5!!!!

Adam, Sheila and NearlyNoelNeill got it right, but maybe if I repost these few snips from part 2 where Wells and Klein are explaining to Lois, it will be more clear ...

"From what Wells told me, and from what I know of temporal theory, Clark encountering himself in 1966 caused the creation of duplicate time lines." Klein straightened with a groan. "Not that I know that much about temporal theory, you understand."

Lois glanced at the older Wells. "Like the alternate Metropolis?"

"Oh, no, my dear. These worlds are identical in every detail. Imagine a stone being cast into still water causing rings to ripple out from the center. The rings are concentric. Since they don't touch each other, they can't overlap and cause an alternate reality..."

Lastly ...

"Theoretically," the elder Wells began, "if you "leap" into each of these extraneous time lines and are successful, they'll vanish in favor of the one *true* time line. There will be no more distortion and Clark will be freed from the temporal loop."

As you can see, these are said to be "extraneous" time lines and that they will vanish in favor of the true time line if she is successful.

When she is successful, she leaps again, and she's in a new time line, but a time line that would have moved along just as the one true time line had to that point she finds herself in. But because she was successful in the previous time line, she leaps forward into the new one (All Shook Up in the one she just left to Barbarians at the Planet in the one she finds herself in now).

I know it's a little complicated, but imagine if your own life history had one true path, but at a certain point, 9 duplicates of that history occurred. If you had the ability to "leap" back into yourself at an earlier point in one of those time lines, you'd be able to change the path of your history, but only in that one time line duplicate that you leaped into because it is in no way connected to the others.

That's the basic technobabble premise of this story, but the duplicates are causing glitches in the real time line. That's why the real time line has to be restored by getting rid of the duplicates, and that's Lois' mission.

Of course, in any story plot, especially if it deals with the "fantastic," some things have to be taken more on faith than logic. In the movie "Mr. Destiny," for example, the protagonist believes his life would have gone in a different and much better direction had he hit a home run during an important baseball game rather than what really happened -- he struck out.

I love these kinds of movies, but in the back of my head I'm thinking that there probably wouldn't have been a profound difference if a 14 year-old boy had hit a home run instead of striking out. However, if a certain actor hadn't wrecked his knee during a pre-game practice for the Buffalo Bills ...

Zoom

What a fascinating way to do a "retrospective", Zoom. I am loving this. I am very curious to see how Lois gets herself out of her current situation. This story show amazing creativity!

Very interesting premise, Zoom. I must say that I too am wondering what happens in each time line when the future Lois 'leaps' out and the old Lois takes over. Will the old Lois remember what happened? Will she have any clue why? Will she deny it all and start undoing what future Lois started. Uh oh, as Austin Powers would say, I've been thinking about time travel too much and I've gone cross eyed.

edit: having now seen Zoom's reply, it all makes much more sense. Thanks, Zoom.

Thanks for the explanation, Zoom... yeah, I think I've got it now!


Wendy

Zoom,
I'm loving this. Can't say I understand it, but I still love it

It's a great way to watch all those old scenes again and see Lois fix things!

But you have to give us more soon, please!
Nicole

Zoom, I'm not going to try too hard to understand the logistics of the story, I'm just going to sit back and continue to enjoy it and wonder what Lois is going to do next.
Gerry

Ah, I get it now. Thanks.

Jessi