"I can certainly write that you gestured in its general direction. But, mm... being evil is not located inside of you. It is in the people that you hurt. When you harm someone else, you are, in a very real sense, hurting your friends. And yet it does not concern you?"

"Only about as much as any given other hobby of my friends' does," he says with a shrug. "Except my friends' other hobbies tend to be less persistently interested in getting in the way of other stuff I want to do."

"Huh! I will certainly admit you present an interesting philosophy. Rephrasing, to make sure I understand - caring about others is, perhaps, like a religion that they hold and you do not, and thus unjust to inflict on you?"

"I would not use the word unjust but sure, we can go with that."

"Would you prefer dickish?"

"Much better! You're good with words."

"It is, as they say, a living. Circling back - not to run too blue, you mentioned enjoying inadvisable sex. The sex fits into your general enjoyment of the simple and physical; would you care to run me through why inadvisable is so appealing? Or even what it would mean, to you?"

(Tintin has more or less entirely forgotten his suspicion that Evil Superman wants to rape him. He is conducting an interview, and the point leads into another; the fact that he's asking the amoral Kryptonian about inadvisable sex is irrelevant.)

He's adorable, Zher wants to hear him scream.

But also he's having a lot of fun with the interview itself. "I," he says, "am Superman. Nothing matters. I can go skinny dipping in the Sun and have a friendly tussle with a black hole, I'm decades older than I look and I have no idea if I'm even capable of aging, I don't need to breathe. Doing inadvisable things is the only way I can feel alive.

"As for what would count... it is sort of an I know it when I see it situation, and I am definitely looking right at it."

Tintin abruptly remembers his suspicion. 

"Context note if necessary: Evil Superman has given the distinct impression that he intends to rape me," he mutters into the recorder, blushing somewhat.

"You say that but I have heightened senses, you know? And I'm getting some different signals than unwillingness."

"Bloodflow does not constitute consent," Tintin sniffs. "– if this is going where I think it is, do you mind if I turn off the recorder? I'm hoping it might help someone put the pieces together once I'm dead and you're him again and possibly also dead, and I don't need amateur pornography on it."

"Sure. The house AI is recording everything anyway so if slash whenever I want to replay it for my personal entertainment I'll be able to. —but also I'm not going to kill you, or I have no plans to, you're delightful."

The recorder clicks off.

"That is... possibly the first time someone has said that to me," Tintin muses. "Not that they have no plans to kill me - well, that too, I suppose."

"Oh, is that where the low self-esteem comes from? You need better friends."

"I do not expect myself to find one in you, but you may be right regardless."

"I think everyone should have someone who thinks they're awesome. It's good for your health."

"In the abstract, I agree, and yet I do not expect my health to improve by your attention."

He tries one of the temporarily neglected nigiri, and his eyes widen sharply.

"There are still fringe benefits," he says once he's chewed and swallowed. "To be clear."

"Oh I didn't mean to suggest I was going to be that person, I was just commenting on the fact that no one's told you this before." And now he's sitting next to Tintin with one arm around him.

Tintin shivers a little. (He never did get that shirt on.)

He deliberately grabs a piece of sushi Tintin hasn't had yet with his hashi and offers it to him.

He tries it, obediently.

"It is very good," he says weakly. "But I am unaccountably queasy."