Chat with the Bat.

Back at the mountain, I surveyed the lush verdant landscape stretching beneath my feet, a cool highland breeze caressing my face, blowing sand into Deku's eye.

"Did you know Deku, that I always wanted to a be a forest ranger?" I asked.

"I mean you did mention it in your sports festival rant, so..." Deku replied, staring off into the distance dangling his feet off the cliff edge, swinging them in imitation of me.

"Other kids, they wanted to be like the heroes of legend, All Might, Endeavor and their sort.

Others yet wanted to be scientists or big business owners, living in mansions, surrounded by hot babes.

I never really got the point of it, any of it really." I drudged on.

"But you understand things so much better than me, people too! Don't you feel you'd do better in a job where you can use your talents the most?" Deku pointed out.

"I suppose that holds true for most people. But then again, most people tend not wander off their set course in life, fearing the unknown. They never engage that spark of exploration in them. No curiosity at all.

And then there's that phrase I read in an old greek book.

Women are creatures that can either be loved or understood, not both.

I think he meant that when you understand them, you see their true ugliness, a form of evil even. And then you can never look at them the same. Or love them for that matter.

In some ways, I think that applies to more than just women." I said.

"Yes, yes. You've talked about this before. People are evil, the only reason to tolerate them is because markets and chocolate and yada yada. What's the point of it, Haru-chan?" Deku asked.

"What's the point of any of it, Deku?" I replied with a sigh.

"Jeez, you're really bored out of your mind aren't you? That's the only time you repeat these inane squabbles with me." Deku commented smiling.

"Well, I'm more tired than bored. Like sort stretched flat, like a puff pastry. Lately, the food....I can't seem to taste it. Like the colors are....muted in a way, if you know what I mean? That lunch we just had, it was delicious no doubt, but that happy satisfied feeling you get after, it was, for me at least, a bit dull, duller than usual. I just...I don't know, don't feel like anythings worth it. Like I should just ramrod through this stuff. And I know I could. I very well could. If I put my mind to it. Say, Deku, what do you thi-"

Suddenly, I noticed it, that familiar grey monochrome.

Deku wasn't there, not quite.

He was frozen as if the world was amber and he a mosquito with dino DNA.

Only this time in black and white and a dozen million shades of gray. That one, those ones.

"So it's you, huh? After all these years of nothing and now you appear. Almost made me think I had depression, you bastard!" I snarked.

"Oh, you do have depression, and not courtesy of moi~, by the way." Other me said.

"Though that's not why I'm here."

"And why are you here, then?" I asked.

"Well you see I was looking for Sergeant Pumpernickel here." he said, lifting up an eldritch abomination from the 5th dimension as if it were a cute little kitty.

"Do you really plan on destroying the world for a joke, bud?" I asked, unimpressed.

"Ugh, fine, alright captain Killjoy. Let me get to the point. Don't!" He replied, nonplussed.

"Don't what?" I asked, feigning ignorance.

"You know what!" He said, "Look, I know what you're planning, and trust me, it won't work. The chains will only bind you stronger, tighter, more ...painfully.

I know because I tried it, same as you. It's ...never so easy.

If it were so easy to get out of ROB contracts, you think I would have had to shunt mine off to you?"

"I won't know until I try!" I protested.

"You won't know until you suffer is what!" He cried.

"Do you know why I've stuck around the past 14 years? In this pathetic little world of bullshit powers?

Because of you!

I feel like shit for having to shove my obligations off to you. And I know you don't hate me for it, but I do.

And listen, I won't blame you for it, if you continue on this cycle. Hell the rest of us have. But please, consider this - you have a chance at what none of us had, if only out of the fact that our great power stops us from loving that which is not us.

But you are different! You have a family, a loving wife, good friends, even if that's just a temporal illusion in a 4th dimensional phase bubble, but that's not the point!

The point is, don't abandon them, this one chance of yours.

After all isn't love worth something, Haru?" He exclaimed, emotionally, putting up a great performance.

I clapped sarcastically at his act.

"Very moving. Much inspired." I mocked.

"Well, a man can try, can't he?" Other me said, defeatedly.

"You just want me to take the L and die on this off kilter pile of dung in your place, don't you?" I asked.

"No. I mean yes, but that's not what I meant." He said.

"What you meant was that I should fuck like a bunny and create more pawns to further distance the contract from you so that even if I die, my progeny will inherit it, without the benefits and hopefully, die a brutal enough death that maybe the contract will by some twist of fate void itself, yes?" I interjected.

"Not in so many words, but that's about right." He said.

"Then that's that isn't it? I already have a son on the way, so you should feel secure in your dealings. Why appear now, of all times?" I asked.

"If you're gonna be so cross about it then I'll leave. But remember," he said, shoving his hand up one of sergeant Pumpernickel's many fanged orifices, twisting it about his hand.

"I wiv awways wuv you, in ma own twistwed way!"

I sighed, fresh out of fucks to give.

"I don't think I need to tell you this, but, please refrain from using eldritch abominations as sock puppets. It can't possibly be healthy."

"Oh, don't worry about it. This little baby can't even scratch my skin." He said, scratching it on the head like a dog.

As I looked at the shoggoth in his hand, the world returned to color again, and time began to flow again.

"Well then, toodles~" he said, blinking out of existence as color returned to the world, all out of sight from me.

"Fuck! Fucker batmanned me again!" I shouted, as I turned around to see a confused Deku looking at me like a madman.