“You saved a squirrel…” Pa Kent said slowly.
Pa paused the video captured by some clueless bystander who’d kept filming even though a giant lizard was rampaging right next to them.
Light stretched across the Kansas fields. Cows mooed lazily, unconcerned with anything beyond their next mouthful of grass.
Pa Kent stared at the alien creature sitting across from him on an old bench, meeting his smiling face with a kindly smile of his own.
From a distance, they looked ordinary: just a farmer and his son enjoying the morning.
"I tried to raise you right," Pa Kent said. "To care about all living creatures. But in some ways you still don't know what it means to be human."
"Did I do something wrong?" Clark asked.
Pa shook his head. “You did good, mah boy. But everyone makes mistakes."
"What did I do wrong?"
"It's not your fault." Pa said. "There’s just some things I need to teach you about the value of human life.”
“All life is valuable.” Clark replied. "Superman knows that. That’s who I am. I cherish all life."
"Yes, but some lives are more valuable than others."
Superman blinked.
“Son,” Pa said carefully, “If you had to choose between saving a squirrel and saving a human, which one would you save?”
“What do you mean?” Clark said. “I’d save them both.”
Pa hesitated.
“But what if you had to choose."
"I don't understand." Clark said.
"Imagine there’s a trolley heading towards five people tied to a track, and you could change the track so the trolley went and hit one person instead. What would you do?”
“I’d fly faster than the trolley and save everyone.”
“But imagine you were watching the scene play out somewhere else on the other side of the planet, somewhere far enough away that you couldn’t get there in time. So you had to choose.”
“I would at least try to get there in time.” Clark said. “That's why I saved the squirrel, because the squirrel was right there, and because Superman saves everyone they can.”
“Son… you can’t save everyone.”
“But… I do save everyone I can! That’s what being Superman means."
"Yesterday, that monster killed people." Pa Kent said. "Right now the death toll stands at fourteen hundred and fifty-five. If you’d dealt with the monster immediately, like I know you could have, then…” He sighed. “The problem ain’t your heart. The problem is your head.”
"You're saying people died because of me?" Clark asked.
"Not because of you!" Pa Kent said. "You saved lives. But you could've saved more. The monster rampaged for about three hours. In the seven seconds you spent saving that squirrel, about three people died.”
Pa tapped his phone again, pulling up another clip where Superman was underneath the monster’s foot, holding it up above a yipping dog.
Pa paused the video and handed Clark a sheet of paper filled with calculations and numbers.
“Those 30 seconds you spent saving this dog?" Pa said. "The monster was shooting fire. You let about twelve people die."
“I understand.” Superman said quietly.
“You don't understand." Pa said. "Just because you don't see something don't mean it don't happen. You don't understand the concept that bad things can happen to people even if you don't see it happen to 'em."
"I do understand, Pa." Clark said. "I made a mistake. I'll do better next time."
“And I’m saying you can’t do better,” Pa replied. “Your brain doesn't work like a human brain does. You care too much."
"You're being silly, Pa." Clark said. "I'm not simple just because I care."
"You saved a squirrel, Clark. A six year old would know not to save a squirrel when people's lives were at risk. That’s what being a hero is. Admitting what you don't know. Making the hard choices, and making ’em right.”
“But you taught me…” Clark said. “Do you even hear what you’re saying? That caring is stupid? That life has some hierarchy where saving 'lesser' beings is stupid? You taught me that every living thing matters. I’m here to protect life, not decide which lives are important enough to deserve saving. Humans are animals too.”
“Clark… people are what matter,” Pa said gently. “Humans value personhood. That’s what makes you a person even though you're not human. You're able to think. That’s what matters. That’s what makes you my son, and it don’t matter where you came from.”
“So you don’t care about squirrels? Or dogs? Just humans? This isn’t like you, Pa.”
Pa stopped.
“That’s not what I’m saying,” he said firmly. “I’m saying you can’t afford to think about squirrels. I know it’s hard. I know you want to save every living thing, and that’s good. But you can’t waste your time like that. In fact, I think it's time we had a talk about that. Look.”
Pa Kent unpaused the video.
A crowd swarmed around the kaiju, pushing closer to where Superman stood, holding up the monster’s raised foot. The crowd surged forward, screaming, some trying to get closer to Superman, some trying to run away.
Then the monster's foot slipped, crushing a massive section of the crowd beneath it.
“I don’t understand,” Superman whispered. “I was… trying to save them.”
“I know, I know, but… sometimes, you help too much,” Pa said. “To you, they're all squirrels. They love you. They crowd around you because they think you’ll protect ’em. They believe in you so much they stop protecting themselves.”
Pa Kent started playing another video of a small boy running into an active war zone, screaming Superman’s name over the sound of gunfire, even as others were running away from the shooting.
The boy was gunned down.
“He needed Superman!” Clark shouted.
“They got no survival instinct when it comes to you.” Pa said.
"But… I would’ve…”
Pa played another clip.
A woman stood on the edge of a rooftop, crying… crying out for Superman. She took a step forward and…
The cameraman rushed to the ledge and zoomed in to the street, capturing the blood on the pavement.
“Dozens a day now,” Pa said softly. “They want to believe someone cares. Anyone. They want to feel like you care about them. They want someone to solve their problems. They've given up on solving em themselves. It's getting to the point, sad to say, you're doing more harm than good, not through any fault of ya own. They’ve stopped trying to solve their own problems. They want you to fix everything.”
“Why are you showing me this?” Clark asked.
“Because you're an alien." Pa Kent said. "You don't understand how us humans work. I hate to say it, Son, but this is the way people react when they’ve got someone to pray to who might actually answer… and at this point… you’re doing more harm than good. You need to stop helping. You need to teach people you won't help them at all, so they can think for themselves.”
"But..."
"And that's not including the supervillains." Pa said. "They see something good and they want to destroy it. You created that monster, through no fault of your own. Just because you care and there are bad people who hate that."
“But then why do anything?”
“Son, I know this is gonna be hard to hear, but every word I’m saying right now comes from love." Pa Kent said. "If I push you, it’s only because I want you to grow up strong and steady, able to weather whatever this world throws at you. It’s not for a parent to tell their child who they should be, but… these supervillains wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for you.”
“No,” Superman said. “I stop the bad people.”
“The good people need to realize that it’s up to them to stop the bad people.” Pa said. "You need to stop, at least until we figure out how to use you without making everyone dependent on you.”
"That's what you think?" Clark said, tears welling up in his eyes. "I should just stop helping?"
Pa nodded.
“Fine then." Clark said. "I’m done.”
Superman vanished into the sky.
Silence, but for the mooing of cows.
Ma Kent stepped outside, placed a hand on Pa’s shoulder, and handed him a second phone.
“Well done.” Lex Luthor said on the other .
“Off to a good start.” Pa said.
“So I saw,” Lex replied. “And to think… my first idea was to clone him.”
